The Racial Disparities of the American Criminal Justice...

What if I were to tell you that the American Criminal Justice System is corrupt? Or, that when it comes to working within the color of the law, police officers work around the color of your skin. Are there racial disparities within The Criminal Justice System? There can be no other answer than yes. In this paper I will examine and prove that racial disparities do exists within The Criminal Justice System through the systematic targeting of people of color as well as through our Judicial System. Systematic Targeting Does anybody not find it interesting that in a country where people of color only make up 30 percent of the population, they account for 60 percent of those imprisoned (Kerby, â€Å"The Top 10†, par. 3)? These disturbing†¦show more content†¦As we all know this is not the case. With people of color being arrested more often in a society they are the minority in only shows that they are being systematically targeted. To say that people of color are systematically targeted may sound a bit controversial. After all according to New Century Foundation’s research blacks are seven times more likely than people of other races to commit a murder, and eight times more likely to commit a robbery (pg. 2). However, when you compare this statistic with the numbers mentioned in the prior paragraph you realize that they are not consistent. The reason why people of color are recognized for being more likely to commit a crime is because African-Americans are incarcerated at a rate of nearly 6 times the rate of whites (Williams, â€Å"Racial Disparities in the Criminal Justice System†, par. 3). So if the minority group is arrested and incarcerated nearly 6 times the rate of the majority group it becomes evident as to why people of color make up 60 percent of the prison population. These numbers are not shocking because they exist; they are shocking because these numbers are seen as the norm by general population. 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