Modern Vectors of Economic Oppression - Criminal Justice

Modern Vectors of Economic Oppression Criminal Justice

White Economic Advantage + Black Economic Suppression = Modern Vectors of Economic Racism

"For the (racial wealth) gap to be closed, America must undergo a vast social transformation produced by the adoption of bold national policies, policies that will forge a way forward by addressing, finally, the long-standing consequences of slavery, the Jim Crow years that followed, and ongoing racism and discrimination that exist in our society today."

W. Darity, D. Hamilton, M. Paul, A Aja, A. Price, A. Moore, and C. Chiopris

Learn about each modern vector of economic racism below:

Reckoning with an Unjust Past: a Spoken Word Series by Veronica Wylie

Summary

Origins of Modern-Day Policing

The origins of our modern-day police mentality can be traced back to the “Slave Patrol”. The earliest formal slave patrol was created in the Carolinas in the early 1700s, with the following mission: to establish a system of terror in response to slave uprisings with the capacity to pursue, apprehend, and return runaway slaves to their owners, including the use of excessive force to control and produce desired slave behavior. Slave Patrols allowed forcible entry into any home solely based on suspicions of protecting runaway slaves. Slave Patrols continued until the end of the Civil War and the passage of the 13th Amendment.

Following the Civil War, during the Reconstruction Period, slave patrols were replaced by militia-style groups who were empowered to control and deny access to equal rights to freed slaves that looked to join the workforce and integrate with society. Their work included the enforcement of Black Codes, strict local and state laws that regulated and restricted access to labor, wages, voting rights, and general freedoms for formerly enslaved people.

In 1868, ratification of the 14^th Amendment technically granted equal protections by laws of Constitutional rights to African Americans – essentially meant to abolish Black Codes. Shortly after the abolishment of Black Codes, Jim Crow Laws, and state and local statutes that legalized racial segregation were enacted. Jim Crow laws looked to vanquish all protected rights of African Americans. By the 1900s, local municipalities began to construct police departments to enforce local laws in areas of the East Coast and Mid-West, including Jim Crow Laws. Local municipalities leaned on police to enforce and exert excessive brutality on African Americans who violated any Jim Crow law. Jim Crow Laws continued through the end of the 1960s.

Since then, African American communities have continued to be under surveillance and targeted by police, including, but not limited to, the era of War on Drugs and mass incarceration.

NAACP | Criminal Justice Fact Sheet

Personal Narratives

"The first time I fit the description of a suspect I was ten. And the more I was stopped for conversations with police, the more I began to make adjustments in my life.

I had to learn not to stand outside the house with nondescript cups, or ride four-deep to the club. Some of our friends like to keep all the registration papers in their glove box ultra-updated. Others get nervous about how many people in their backseats are wearing ball caps.

For as long as the term racial profiling has been around, fools have been denying the phenomenon exists. But I contend every black man in America, at some point, will be racially profiled or harassed by the police. It's a part of the DNA of our experience in the United States.

One morning last spring while I was parking my car at the BART train station, a police officer looked at me and ran my license plate. He entered a false number, and my Oldsmobile Royale Brougham 88 came back as a stolen Honda. So now I'm a car thief. My friend, Elmer(ph), and I weren't prepared for what happened next.

ELMER: Our conversation was interrupted very rudely and abruptly.

Mr. HOWELL: I mean, just how to - what happened.

ELMER: In the distant background I hear the voice of a police officer saying, everybody move aside. And I turned around to see the barrel of this officer's handgun staring me down, face to face. And he tells me to step back and stand on the concrete.

He said, you know, brothers like you, I know how you all get down. You all be in the street, you all steal cars. You're like, you know, he's not talking to us like, you know, like citizens, you know. He's talking to us like we're convicted criminals that he's delivering to Massachusetts for multiple murders..."

Anyi Howell

A Personal Story of Racial Profiling: NPR

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"In Thin Blue Lie, author Matt Stroud details the troubling history of the taser, the incorporation of various technologies (dash cams, body cams, etc.) in police departments across the country, and the increasing militarization that came with them. He touches on half-hearted federal, state, and municipal attempts at police reform, and he also says this:

“Policemen deal with people when they are both most threatening and most vulnerable, when they are angry, when they are frightened, when they are desperate, when they are drunk, when they are violent, or when they are ashamed. . . . Every police action can affect in some way someone’s dignity, or self-respect, or sense of privacy, or constitutional rights.” (p. 9)

I find it intriguing that the very ways he mentions police action can affect others — dignity, respect, privacy (bodily autonomy), and Constitutional rights — were actively denied to my grandfather and his partner, both as regular citizens, and as police officers. Like countless Black officers across the country at the time, they were told not to bother white citizens in the county, and that they did not have [arrest] authority over them. This county was, and still remains, overwhelmingly white. This is something that has always bothered me when people try to counter #BlackLivesMatter with #BlueLivesMatter. This is aside from the fact that “blue” is not an artificial, settler-colonial white supremacist racial category, but is a chosen profession. It was made abundantly clear by the department and reinforced by white citizens, that they were to be treated as n-words first; respecting the authority of the uniform was optional. Barnes would stay an officer for four years, my grandfather, for six and a half.[6]"

Methods of Discrimination

Black People have disproportionate levels of police contact leading to a disproportionate level of investigations. Specific policies target Black communities[1].
The War on Drugs which disproportionately targets drug activity in black vs white communities.
“Broken Windows” policies which zero in on petty offenses (Black codes)
Stop, Question, and Frisk policies target Black male residents in low-income communities disproportionately.
Jury selection has historically reflected " a jury of peers."
Unequal treatment of Black law enforcement officers

Pretrial Incarceration & Bail

In 2016, African Americans were incarcerated in local jails at a rate 3.5 times that of non-Hispanic whites.
Pretrial detention increases the odds of conviction.
Pretrial releases require money bond.
Blacks are more likely than whites to be assessed higher safety and flight risks, denied bail, to have a higher money bond set, and to be detained because they cannot pay their bond[3].

Jury Selection

Nearly 135 years after Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1875 to eliminate racial discrimination in jury selection, people of color continue to be excluded from jury service because of their race, especially in serious criminal trials and death penalty cases.

In 2010, EJI released the most comprehensive study of racial bias in jury selection since the Supreme Court tried to limit the practice in Batson v. Kentucky in 1986.[5]

Sentencing

Racial disparities in sentencing are compounded by disparities in policing and pretrial. Discretionary decision making and sentencing policies tax the already overburdened[1].

1.In comparison to white people, Prosecutors are more likely to charge black people with crimes that carry heavier sentences, offenses that carry a mandatory minimum sentence and make use of habitual offender laws.

2.Public Defenders are underfunded, have excessively high caseloads often offering presumed offenders services of little quality.

Parole

Parole boards can exercise discretion in releasing prisoners early[1].

1.Studies suggest that parole boards are influenced by an applicant’s race in their decision making.

2.Racial bias in correctional officers also shape parole decisions.

3.Once released, parole and probation officers are more likely to revoke people of color than whites for comparable behavior leading to higher recidivism rates.

Collateral Consequences

A host of barriers have been enacted against people with criminal records that limit their access to consistent employment and housing, social benefits, federal student aid, and exercising their voting rights[1].

Racial Bias in Exoneration

25000 Years.pdf (umich.edu)

Timeline of Disparity

Timeline of the Modern Prison (Truah Org)

1829 Eastern State Penitentiary, the 1st modern prison,
opens in Philadelphia. It pioneers the use of solitary
confinement, to give incarcerated people time for reflection
and “penitence.”

1838 Debtors’ prisons, where people could be incarcerated
for failing to pay their debts, banned under federal law.
Bankruptcy law subsequently replaces debtors’ prisons.

1866 Convict leasing—the practice of leasing out
incarcerated people (usually black men) to work for private
individuals—begins.

1914 Congress passes Harrison Narcotics Tax Act,
restricting the sale of opiates and cocaine, launching the
country’s “first war on drugs.”

1927 first federal women’s prison opens in Alderson, WV.

1928 Alabama becomes the last state to outlaw convict leasing.

1943 “Zoot Suit Riots” in LA and Detroit riots, two
examples of racial violence that break out during and after
WW2; this leads to calls for increased national attention to
police brutality and misconduct. Before WW2, most criminal
justice policy in the US was in the hands of local or state
authorities.

1955 Deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill begins;
closing of mental hospitals and reduction in overall state care
for people with serious mental illness. Jails and prisons
eventually take up the slack.

1960’s US and most western countries experience dramatic
increase in crime. From 1962-1972, the annual number of
homicides more than doubles. Homicide rate among
blacks had been several times higher than whites since at least
the 1930’s.

1963 Supreme Court — in Gideon v. Wainwright — rules
that indigent criminal defendants have a right to a lawyer.
#e Court says nothing about how to pay for such counsel,
leading to a rise in fees charged to defendants. (See more
under “Poverty and Mass Incarceration,” p. 35.) In the 1960’s,
a number of rulings by the Warren Court expand the rights of
incarcerated people and people being policed, at the expense
of police power.

1964 Goldwater campaign uses explicitly racial language to
discuss crime. Conservatives conflate riots, street crime, and
political activism.

1965 Johnson creates Office of Law Enforcement
Assistance, with support from left and right. OLEA provides
funding and programs to expand and improve state and local
criminal justice systems.

Metrics

“African Americans are more likely than white Americans to be arrested; once arrested, they are more likely to be convicted; and once convicted, and they are more likely to experience lengthy prison sentences...African American adults are 5.9 times as likely to be incarcerated than white adults.” -The Sentencing Project [1]

The ACLU found that blacks were 3.7 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than whites in 2010, even though their rate of marijuana usage was comparable [2].

In 2010, 1 out of every 3 African American males had a felony conviction.

Visualizing the racial disparities in mass incarceration | Prison Policy Initiative

Questions for Research and Reflection:

Which myths based on white supremacy culture did you grow up hearing?

I've always had a good relationship with our police officers. Why can't "they?"
If "those" people would just behave well, they wouldn't get in trouble with the police
Black people are naturally violent
The criminal justice system treats all people the same
Same crime, same punishment - sentencing is the same for everyone.
Anyone should be able to afford bail

Self-reflection questions:

What has been your experience with law enforcement officers? How does skin color affect treatment?
If you were stopped by a policeman, would you expect to be helped or harmed? Why?
How were you affected by the death of George Floyd? What did you learn about criminal justice?
Should armed police officers respond to every 911 call? Is there a better way to handle mental health, homelessness and social-service related calls?
How many family members, friends or colleagues have been incarcerated? How does their story compare to the stories on this page?