Patricia Y. Warren

Perceptions of Police Disrespect During Vehicle Stops: A Race-Based Analysis:

Blacks and Whites perceive American social institutions in very different terms, and views of the police are no exception. Prior research has consistently demonstrated that race is one of the most salient predictors of attitudes toward the police, with African Americans expressing more dissatisfaction than Whites. The purpose of this research is to evaluate this issue by examining the relative influence of vicarious experience and more general trust in social institutions on Black-White differences in perceptions of disrespect by the police. Using survey data from the North Carolina Highway Traffic Study, the results suggest that vicarious experience and more long-standing trust in social institutions influence the likelihood that respondents will perceive police as disrespectful.

The Imprisonment Penalty for Young Black and Hispanic Males A Crime-Specific Analysis

In the United States, there are well-known racial, ethnic, age, and sex differences in incarceration rates. Younger offenders are more likely to be sentenced to prison than are older offenders. Black and Hispanic rates of incarceration are six to eight times that of White offenders and males are 14 times as likely as women to be sentenced to prison. This research explores how the combined effects of race, ethnicity, age, and sex, net of legally relevant factors, influence the decision to incarcerate. We examine these effects across nine offense categories. The analysis is based on Florida felony conviction data for the years 2000 to 2006. We find that legally relevant factors significantly influence the incarceration decision. Young Black males are most disadvantaged at the incarceration decision.

Racial, Ethnic, and Gender Differences in Perceptions of the Police The Salience of Officer Race Within the Context of Racial Profiling

Prior research has consistently demonstrated the salience of minority status in understanding racial and ethnic differences in perceptions of the police. This research has overwhelmingly shown that Blacks and Latinos hold lower levels of trust and confidence in the police than do Whites and other racial minorities. The increased skepticism of the police expressed by minority citizens is commonly associated with racial profiling and documented racial disparities in police behavior. Although policing research has empirically demonstrated the influence of race on perceptions of the police, few studies have explored the relevance of officer race in shaping citizens’ evaluations of police encounters. Using data from the BJS Police–Public Contact Survey, the purpose of this study is to examine whether racial variation in evaluations of police behavior is moderated by the race of the officer. The results suggest that officer race may be an important factor in shaping citizen perceptions of police stops, particularly when it comes to Black citizens. This finding is important as it provides some evidence that increasing the number of minority officers may be one viable option for improving citizen–officer relations.

Racial, Ethnic, and Immigrant Threat Is There a New Criminal Threat on State Sentencing?

Objectives: The racial threat perspective argues that racial minorities are subjected to greater punishment in places with large or growing minority populations. However, prior research has focused largely on Black populations while devoting limited attention to potential “Latino threat” or “immigrant threat” effects. To address these gaps, this study explores the effects of racial, ethnic, and immigrant threat on sentence disposition (jail, prison, or community corrections) and sentence length. Methods: Using 2000 through 2006 data from the Florida Department of Corrections Guideline database, we use multilevel modeling techniques to explore the effects of racial, ethnic, and immigrant threat on state criminal sentencing. Results: The results provide support for racial/ethnic threat theory among Black but not Latino defendants. Black defendants are more likely to be sentenced to prison and are given longer sentences in counties with growing Black populations. In contrast, Latino sentences are not significantly influenced by Latino population growth. Results provide no support for immigrant threat positions. Conclusions: Overall, our findings offer a complex picture for racial/ethnic and immigrant threat. However, one pattern remains clear. Within Florida courts, Black defendants continue to be the prime targets for effects of racial threat and resulting disadvantages in criminal sentencing.

CYNICAL STREETS: NEIGHBORHOOD SOCIAL PROCESSES AND PERCEPTIONS OF CRIMINAL INJUSTICE*

Studies have found that African Americans are more likely to perceive racial biases in the criminal justice system than are those from other racial groups. There is a limited understanding of how neighborhood social processes affect variation in these perceptions. This study formulates a series of hypotheses focused on whether perceived racial biases in the criminal justice system or perceptions of injustice vary as a function of levels of moral and legal cynicism as well as of adverse police–citizen encounters. These hypotheses are tested with multilevel regression models applied to data from a sample of 689 African Americans located in 39 neighborhoods. Findings from the regression models indicate that the positive association between structural disadvantage and perceptions of injustice is accounted for by moral and legal cynicism. Furthermore, adverse police encounters significantly increase perceptions of injustice; controlling for these encounters reduces the strength of the association between cynicism and injustice perceptions. Finally, the findings reveal that cynicism intensifies the association between adverse police encounters and perceptions of criminal injustice. The results are discussed in terms of their implications for research regarding perceived biases in the criminal justice system and neighborhood social processes.

Culture and Formal Social Control: The Effect of the Code of the Street on Police and Court Decision-making

Objectives. Drawing on several interrelated lines of scholarship, we argue that cultural beliefs at individual and neighborhood levels may affect police and court decisions. We hypothesize that individuals who more strongly adhere to the code of the street or reside in areas where the street code culture is more strongly embraced will be more likely to be arrested and convicted, and that neighborhood-level effects will amplify the effect of street code adherence. Methods. To test these hypotheses, data from the Family and Community Health Study are examined using multilevel modeling. Results. Blacks who more strongly adhered to street code beliefs were more likely to be arrested and convicted; this effect was greater among those who resided in areas where the code of the street belief system was more entrenched. Conclusions. The findings highlight the potential usefulness of a focus on culture for understanding the exercise of formal social control.

Explaining and Eliminating Racial Profiling

The emancipation of slaves is a century-and-a-half in Americas past. Many would consider it ancient history. Even the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which challenged the de facto racial apartheid of the post-CivilWar period, are now well over 40 years old. But even in the face of such well-established laws, racial inequalities in education, housing, employment, and law enforcement remain widespread in the United States.

Racial Threat, Intergroup Contact, and School Punishment:

Objectives: Drawing on the racial threat and intergroup contact literatures, we explore whether (1) a school’s racial or ethnic context increases school suspensions for Black, Hispanic, and White students; (2) intergroup contact among school board members reduces school suspensions for Black, Hispanic, and White students; and (3) a school’s racial or ethnic context effects on school suspensions are conditioned by intergroup contact among school board members. Method: Count-dependent multilevel modeling techniques on school- and district-level measures from a representative sample of Florida middle and high schools. Results: Larger racial and ethnic student populations within schools increase the likelihood of suspensions for Black and Hispanic students while decreasing suspensions for White students. Further, higher levels of intergroup contact between Black, White, and Hispanic school board members are associated with a lower likelihood of suspensions for all students. Finally, intergroup contact between Black, White, and Hispanic school board members moderates the effects of school racial and ethnic context on school suspensions. Conclusions: Important factors are associated with school punishment for Black, Hispanic, and White students. Integrated spaces play an important role in decreasing both punishment disparities and punishment severity.

White’s Residential Preferences: Reassessing the Relevance of Criminal and Economic Stereotypes

In the United States Black citizens are more residentially segregated from Whites than other racial and/or ethnic group. Prior studies have found that these patterns of segregation result in part from feelings of resentment and racial stereotypes that Whites hold toward Blacks. In this study, we further explore this idea by assessing the relevance of criminal and economic stereotypes, along with an extensive set of community and individual-level controls in understanding White citizens preferences for segregation. Utilizing a sample of 1,222 White citizens we explore factors that shape their residential preferences. Our results demonstrate that Whites who view Black citizens as criminal and economic liabilities are less willing to desire them as neighbors. The results also suggest that the growth of the Black population further erodes White’s willingness to reside in communities with Black residents.

Race and Policing in America: Conflict and Reform By Ronald Weitzer and Steven A. Tuch Cambridge University Press. 2006. 238 pages.

to antisocial and delinquent behavior in children and adolescents. Less successful is their attempt to visually display developmental pathways to delinquency in the form of three-dimensional models. But their models are paragons of clarity next to Le Blanc’s diagrams in the following chapter showing how self and social controls develop from a chaos perspective (see P. 217, Figure 6.3, and P. 221, Figure 6.4). Le Blanc’s discussion is heavy going and way, way outside the box of contemporary criminology. The following sentence is typical: “The coupled motion of the interactions between the self and social control and deviant behavior systems wraps the coupled motion around the surface of a torus.” (P. 220) Even the venerable C. Wright Mills (1959), who masterfully deconstructed Parsons’ grand theory, would, I fear, fail to crack this code. Bottoms concludes the volume by considering the problem of human agency in the context of desistance from crime. Given risk-factor research showing the importance of various causal conditions, some operating early in life, in the explanation of criminal behavior, how much room is left for “uncaused” human volition in the analysis of desistance? Indeed, how can we analytically distinguish caused from uncaused behavior? Although Bottoms does not resolve these important issues, he suggests ways in which some current sociological and philosophical thinking on human agency may contribute to the study of desistance. Here again, while leaping over criminology for fresh criminological inspiration has some value, it is not clear to me that we will learn more about choice, constraint and crime from Bottoms’ sources than from David Matza (1964) or other insiders whose work this provocative volume too easily overlooks.