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: Lawbeat

WSJ's crime stats smell fishy

By Mark Obbie

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Jennifer Forsyth and Leslie Eaton break little new ground in this profile today in The Wall Street Journal of Dallas DA Craig Watkins, who months or even years ago achieved national renown for his aggressive break with Dallas' lock-em-up history. The story traces Watkins' role in reexamining cases of suspected wrongful conviction, and using DNA to exonerate defendants. All that's potentially new in the story is criticism of Watkins' publicity-seeking ways, and a critical look at his attacks on his predecessors. It's useful, but not fleshed out in a definitive way. What really caught my eye, though, was this graf in which Watkins makes the case that he's not just exonerating the innocent:

He points to his overall record, which is similar to his predecessor's. According to court data, 61% of capital-murder cases his office has handled so far have resulted in convictions; the previous district attorney, Bill Hill, got convictions in 55% of capital-murder cases during a comparable period of time. Mr. Watkins has convicted 48% of murder cases and 34% of sexual-assault cases involving an adult, compared to 48% and 31%, respectively, for Mr. Hill.

The numbers are presented as if they represent a good prosecutorial win rate, but in fact those percentages appear shockingly low to anyone familiar with the criminal justice system. Ordinarily felony conviction rates -- commonly expressed as the percentage of all charges to result in conviction -- are just a few points south of 100 percent, in large part because plea bargaining ensures that most defendants are convicted of something. So what's going on here? Are these the convictions based on all reported crimes, vs. all crimes charged? Or of all cases that went to trial? I wasn't able to find the answers on the DA's Web site or in The Dallas Morning News, which has aggressively covered wrongful convictions in its city (see this archive and this recent investigative project). Any ideas?

Full post as published by Lawbeat on November 15, 2008 (boomark / email).