JUVENILE JUSTICE STATISTICS DISTURBING

It was another report with disturbingly familiar findings. A
comprehensive study of juvenile crime rates released last week found
African-American and Hispanic juveniles are treated more severely than
white juveniles at every step of the juvenile justice system, from
arrest to trial to sentencing. The difference in treatment is
compounded with each additional step through the system, resulting in
huge racial disparities that undermine our nation's fundamental values
of justice. We strongly endorse the recommendations of the researchers
urging the U.S. Congress to allocate $100 million to the U.S. Justice
Department to reduce the glaring racial disparities.

The report is a compilation of national and state data collected by
the FBI, a Justice Department juvenile justice agency, the U.S. Census
Bureau and the research component of the National Council of Juvenile
and Family Court Judges. It was financed by an unusual collection of
groups, including the Ford, MacArthur and Rockefeller
Foundations.

Its findings are deeply disturbing. Overall, when white and minority
youth were charged with the same offenses, African-American young
people were six times more likely to be incarcerated than white young
people with the same records; Hispanic youth were three times more
likely than white youth with the same records. (The report warns the
disparities for Hispanic youth are probably underreported because they
are often classified as white.)

African Americans are disproportionately involved in the criminal
justice system from step one. While African-American youth make up 15
percent of the population under 18, they comprise 26 percent of those
arrested under 18. In comparison, white youth make up 79 percent of
the under-18 population and 71 percent of those arrested.

As the juveniles moved through the process, the disparities increased.
African-American youth were 34 percent of those formally processed by
juvenile courts while whites comprised 63 percent; African Americans
made up 46 percent of those sent to adult criminal court while whites
were 50 percent. In the final category, the accumulated differences
resulted in a stark disparity. Again as only 15 percent of the youth
population, African Americans were 58 percent of young people sent to
adult state prisons while whites, at 79 percent of the youth
population, were only 25 percent of young people sent to adult state
prisons.

We said the report had disturbingly familiar findings because other
reports have found similar racial disparities in the adult criminal
justice system. The recent report on the juvenile justice system helps
explain how African Americans and Hispanics enter adulthood already at
a disadvantage because of racial disparities in the juvenile system.

Critics of earlier studies have suggested the disparities reflect that
African Americans and Hispanics commit a disproportionate number of
crimes. Researchers of the recent study say that explanation cannot
explain the huge differences documented.

In fact, in several instances the disparities were found between
juveniles with the same records or accused of similar crimes. For
example, among young people who had never before gone to juvenile
prison, African Americans are more than six times as likely as whites
to be sentenced to prison. For young people charged with a drug
offense, African Americans are 48 times as likely as whites to be
sentenced to prison.

In the words of one of the organizers of the research project, "It is
undeniable that race is a factor." In the past year we've become more
aware of the prevalence of racial profiling, where police officers
stop people because they are African American or Hispanic, a practice
that also contributes to the disproportionate arrest and incarceration
of minority youth.

If these gross disparities are now being documented, the public has
already been aware of them. In a telling finding, last year the
American Bar Association conducted a survey that found 47 percent of
the public believed the courts treated minorities unfairly. The
president of the association warned that such a perception of bias
will erode confidence in our justice system.

As an increasing number of states pass laws to make it easier to try
juveniles as adults, like California's Proposition 21, these
inequities in the juvenile justice system have even more ominous results.

Fairness and equity are principles fundamental to our system of laws
and justice. We can not survive as a free society based on a respect
for the law if we tolerate racial injustice, particularly in the
juvenile justice system. As the report on juvenile justice indicates,
disparities there lay the groundwork for continued racial disparity in
the adult criminal justice system and as a result, our society as a
whole.

We urge Congress to take the recommendations of the report seriously
- -- allocate funds to the Justice Department to eliminate the disparity
and require states to spend a quarter of their federal juvenile
justice funds toward the same end. Otherwise, we risk a crippling of
our justice system.