Prosecutorial discretion exercised under uncertainty and time pressure falls back on racial stereotypes.

Evidence

As tempting as it is to think that each case is unique and that prosecutorial work is a nuanced undertaking, prosecutors often operate with limited information about what actually transpired, and this may lead to reliance on extralegal influences, such as racial stereotypes (Kutateladze, Lawson, & Andiloro, 2015). An analysis of 2010 and 2011 felony drug cases in New York City found that, of numerous evidentiary factors considered, almost none mattered for predicting sentence offers (Kutateladze, Lawson, & Andiloro, 2015). In addition to limited information, prosecutors also operate under time constraints, another factor that has been shown to lead to reliance on extralegal factors (Albonetti, 1991; see also Kahneman, 2011, for a discussion of reliance on heuristics). And most importantly, a difficulty inherent to legal work generally and prosecutorial work specifically is that decisions often must be made in the absence of clear baselines. This is especially true when a prosecutor is determining which charges best attach to a specific fact pattern. Given these constraints, prosecutors are especially liable to overreliance on stereotypes, such as the association of African Americans with violence and criminality (see, for example, Hawkins, 1981; Steffensmeier, Ulmer, & Kramer, 1998). — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law, 1213

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Kahneman’s dual-process/heuristics work already in the reader’s mental library; also a canonical example of ‘correction backfire’ conditions in an institutional setting.
• 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…, 1213