Doctrinal shifts lowering evidence standards enabled aggressive enforcement producing racial disparities

Evidence

Undoubtedly, these philosophical shifts toward and attendant policy shifts in drug control strategy are central in explaining the observed changes in drug sanctioning, but they are only part of the explanation. Several other, less obvious, changes facilitated the large increase in the number of Americans, and African Americans, in particular, sanctioned for drug offenses. One important but underappreciated factor is a series of legal rulings that granted law enforcement greater powers, which were then used to more aggressively enforce drug laws. There are many such rulings but three are particularly relevant for explaining racial disparities in drug sanctioning. First, the Supreme Court ruled in Terry v. Ohio (1968) that police officers can lawfully stop and question individuals who raise “reasonable suspicion” of criminal activity, and if the individual appears dangerous, police may pat down or frisk the individual’s outer layer of clothing. This standard of reasonable suspicion is a decidedly lower evidentiary standard than “probable cause,”—the standard for an arrest. — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law, 1065

Categorization

• XREF: Terry stops shaping racial disparity connects to the sincere-conviction-vs-measured-bias gap theme: legal doctrine assumed neutral, but enforcement discretion became the bias carrier. — connects to: Relaxing evidence rules shifts their burden from protection to exposure depending on one’s position — Henry M. Hart, Jr. and Albert M. Sacks, The Legal Process: Basic Problems in…, 4840
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law: A Definitive Look at…, 1065