Diversity in Criminal Justice - Assignment Example

Diversity in Criminal Justice Affiliation: Describe the roles race and social class play in to the criminal justice system and how they affect a community’s perceptions of the system. Statistics indicate that over 24% of African Americans compared to 10% of the whites live below the poverty line. This poverty leads to lack of other amenities such as lack of housing among others. What this means that most of the African Americans are likely to commit crime for their survival and they are also victimized criminally by the justice system. This is evident in the overrepresentation of the African Americans in prison. Compared to the whites, the African Americans are six times more likely to be victims of crime. This is in crimes such as sexual assault, robbery, personal theft and other aggravated assaults. The other group of people most likely to be victimized is the Hispanics because these two groups are poor and minority in the country. The African American males have a seven times chances of going to prison in their life time because of homicide cases and they constitute the majority in the death row inmates. Their overrepresentation in the justice system is indicated in statistics whereby they constitute 40% in the state and federal prisons, 42% in the death row, 41% in the parolees and 30% in the probationers list (Northern Arizona University and Criminal Justice Collective, 2009). Whether they committed the crime or were unfairly charged, the number of African Americans in the criminal justice system are still too many compared to any other race and especially the whites. The unfair victimization of the African Americans is mostly brought about by the social class. Research indicates that the wealthy are treated by the criminal justice system differently from the poor. Any crimes the rich and wealthy commit is usually processed in the civil courts where only monetary fines are inflicted on them and the cases dropped or turned around. They are able to afford the lawyers of high caliber who are most likely to get their charges dropped or withdrawn even though they may truly have been involved in committing the crime. The reverse is true for the poor in the society who are considered to belong to the lowest social class. They are quickly jailed even pending trial with no monetary fines or bail allowed. Even when the monetary fines are inflicted on them, they are not able to pay as they cannot afford. Due to their desolate situation in life from the lack of employment or proper employment to the lack of housing and any savings, they are more likely to be considered as crime perpetrators and especially if they are going against the rich and wealthy. The street crimes are most likely committed by the poor people and this involves minor crimes like robbery while the white collar crimes with a lot of money involved with them are most likely committed or at least masterminded by the rich and wealthy. When it comes to being charged however, those who committed street crimes are incarcerated and put to jail to serve a long jail term while the rich and wealthy (and majority of them are white) are left to serve house arrests or put in jail under federal protection. This class and race disparities in the criminal justice system in a country that prides itself in equality leads to lack of belief in the criminal justice system. The Africa Americans do not believe that they can even get any justice in the criminal system from the time of arrest to carrying out investigation to court cases and ruling. The whites on the other hand continue to openly commit crimes as they know that the criminal justice system will favor them. This situation worsens when social class becomes involved where the rich and wealthy know that they will never go to jail or committing crimes no matter the magnitude and when and if they do, they will be under state or federal protection and will get the comfort and privileges even in prison. It is no wonder the people are taken justice into their own hands with cases of mob crimes and lynching being heard or murder cases on the white people who have continually been receiving unfair treatment by the justice system. The blacks know that no matter the magnitude of their crimes, they will serve long sentences in prison and hence they commit murder to try and get the justice they deserve. They organize mass protests in cases against the African Americans in trying to seek fair ruling and mobilizing the human rights organizations to intervene. Using the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman court case in Florida, explain how race, age, community perceptions, and the inner workings of the criminal justice system correlated in determining a verdict. The case was a second degree murder of Trayvon Martin who was a black teenager and was committed by George Zimmerman a 29 year old white man. After six weeks of trial, the jury acquitted him of all the second degree murder charges and the manslaughter. Zimmerman’s lawyer who was paid expensively argued that his client shot the teenager in self-defense as the teenager had physically assaulted him. The powerful lawyer was clearly heard and believed by the jury as they ruled in his favor. The black teenager did not have wealthy parents and hence could not afford the big shot defense attorneys who would have made their chances of winning more. The fact that they lacked the monetary ability to hire the best lawyer for their son as well as the fact that the victim was a teenager played a great role in the acquittal ruling. Just like the African Americans and the poor in the society are marginalized and discriminated in the criminal justice system, so are the young people. Teenagers are most likely to be convicted of crimes because similar to the poor people, they lack proper white collar employment and most are involved in drugs. This combined with the fact that most of the convicted teenagers are Africa Americans spells disaster. After the ruling of this case, human rights activists and especially those of African Americans raised debates and demonstrations even outside of the court house but this did not make any difference in the fact that Martin never got the justice that he deserved. Debates raised also involved the fact that if the situations were reversed and Trayvon was the one who had shot Zimmerman, the automatic verdict would have been first class murder with death penalty or at least life sentencing and Trayvon would have most likely been charged as an adult. This is the extent of the unfairness of the criminal justice system. References Northern Arizona University and Criminal Justice Collective. (2009). Investigating difference: human and cultural relations in criminal justice. New York: Pearson Prentice Hall. Read More