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Report of The Sentencing Project to the United Nations Human Rights Committee: Regarding Racial Disparities in the United States Criminal Justice System

“This report chronicles the racial disparity that permeates every stage of the United States criminal justice system, from arrest to trial to sentencing. In particular, the report highlights the influence of implicit racial bias and recounts the findings of the burgeoning scholarship on the role of such bias in the criminal justice system” (p. 2). Sections cover: racial disparity in police activity; racial disparity in trials-indigent defense counsel, prosecution, and juries, trial judges, and presumptions of innocence; racial disparity in sentencing-capital punishment, and the “War on Drugs”; closing the courthouse door-discretion, racial bias, and the Supreme Court; and ten recommendations for reducing racial bias in the criminal justice system.