Prosecutors attribute racial disparities to poverty and crime patterns rather than bias

Evidence

Most line prosecutors acknowledge the overrepresentation of people of color in the CJS, often referencing a stark contrast in the skin color among defendants they see in courtrooms on a daily basis. There is a widespread belief that these disparities are not reflective of differential treatment by law enforcement and that it is not racial bias that drives these disparities. Most said that, instead, it was the poverty and lack of opportunities in minority neighborhoods that caused crime, which leads law enforcement to focus more on these neighborhoods and make arrests. … A handful of prosecutors have said that race can unduly influence police actions, but even then, these were perceived as unique cases rather than a trend. — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law, 601

Categorization

• XREF: Direct evidence for the reader’s belief-externalization question: professionals whose institutional decisions produce disparities deny racially-based causation and attribute it to upstream socioeconomic factors, echoing how group members attribute conflict to the out-group’s circumstances.
• 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…, 601