Reflection Paper About Jose's Life

Similarly, Jose said the Humboldt Park consisted of gangs, drugs, and violence. The neighborhood was very dangerous so for his safety and his siblings’ safety, his parents would send them to Mexico the whole summer to keep them out of trouble. He feels like overall this experience helped him culturally because he was able to see the differences between the U.S. and Mexico. He talked about the violent experiences he faced in his neighborhood on a daily basis, for example while playing baseball at the park shootings between gangs would break out so they would have to tuck down for their safety. He talked about being stopped by gang members and being “checked” or asked to what gang he was affiliated with even though he was not involved with …show more content…
He talked about how the judge has a lot of power in decision making of someone else’s future. He gave his personal example of how he was chosen as an alternate juror and was arrested for being late to court. He accidently got lost on the train on his way to court so he when he got there the judge was very mad questioning his reason for being late. The judge ordered for Jose to be handcuffed for contempt of court (being disobedient, disrespectful or rude towards the judge). He was kept there for a while and was assigned a public defender, who was trying to ask for the truth because he did not believe him. Eventually they let him go but this made him realize how the judge has so much power over so many lives. For example if the judge is having a bad day they can give a harsher punishment to some people. This also shows how income plays a large role in the court system because those with higher income are able to get a private attorney to fight for their case. On the other hand those who are of lower income cannot afford a private attorney and are assigned a public defender. This already decreases their chances of winning a case and as Jose said this happens every day so there are a lot of poor minorities who cannot afford a private …show more content…
There is an unequal protection from the justice system because police officers use racial profiling, hyper-criminalization of youth, view minorities as a threat and treat them differently. We understood how police officers have a Blue Brotherhood and how discrimination continues to exist. Many people find it uncomfortable to talk about race but it is something that is always present. Those who do not experience discrimination against them may believe that it does not exist but for those who go through it on a daily basis know that it is very real and present. Because of the age and gender differences we felt like Jose, who is a male had more experiences facing discrimination and had more encounters with the police than Katrina because men are more hyper-criminalized than women. Their interviews showed how because of the negative experiences with the police and their unequal protection, minority groups view the police as more of an enemy than a friend. They continue to see how Black and Latinos get a harsher punishment than Whites for the same crimes and continue to see how race plays a large role in the justice system rather or people try to acknowledge it. Some of the limitations encountered for this research was that we only interviewed two persons because that was the limit. Maybe if we