Racial Disparity in Florida Sentencing

This wikilog article is a draft, it was not published yet.

by: Ryan Scott • December 11, 2016 • no comments

Disturbing analysis reported on here. Key paragraphs:

Points are now used to calculate sentences based on the severity of the crime, the defendant’s prior record and a host of other factors. The idea is to punish criminals in Pensacola the same as those in Key West — no matter their race, gender or wealth.

But the point system has not stopped discrimination.

In Manatee County, judges sentence whites convicted of felony drug possession to an average of five months behind bars.

They give blacks with identical charges and records more than a year.

Judges in the Florida Panhandle county of Okaloosa sentence whites to nearly five months for battery.

They lock up blacks for almost a year.

Along the state’s northeast shore, judges in Flagler County put blacks convicted of armed robbery away for nearly triple the time.