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Famed researchers write in support of NC Racial Justice Act

By Douglas A. Berman

Thanks to this post at DPIC, I see that renowned researchers David Baldus and George Woodworth have penned an op-ed supporting North Carolina's proposed Racial Justice Act. Here is how the piece starts: The various attacks on the proposed North Carolina Racial Justice Act, a bill that would allow capital defendants to present claims of racial bias to the court, are, at best, based on a lack of understanding, and at worst, emotional and misleading arguments used in an effort to obscure the issues. Some critics claim that the use of statistics to show racial bias in death penalty cases is inappropriate, but these critics offer no alternatives. Statistical analysis provides the only way to understand the role of racial bias in a system. Rigorous statistical analyses, grounded in actual information about the crimes and the charging and sentencing decisions relating to them, facilitate a nuanced understanding of the real role of race...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on August 02, 2009 (boomark / email).