If you are a minority, a felon and currently serving time for a crime you committed, you will now be able to get a new trial or sentence. All you need to do is to “demonstrate that in the past, criminal suspects of his race were arrested, prosecuted or sentenced more often or more severely than members of other racial groups”. It does not matter if members of your race actually committed more crimes, in fact, if that is the case then that is actually better for you. This flies in the face of a U.S. Supreme Court decision that stated that a defendant had to show that “decision makers acted with discriminatory purpose; statistical disparities aren’t enough”. Thus, if a police office stops a suspect and uses the phrase “high crime area”, the officer has shown a “bias against people of color”, even if the area is in fact a “high crime area”.
How exactly does this law protect law abiding citizens? It does not as in Los Angeles, “blacks are 21 times as likely as white to commit a violent crime, 36 times as likely to commit a robbery and 57 times as likely to commit a homicide”. And who are the victims? In Los Angeles for example, blacks are 17 times as likely to be victims of homicide. Being lenient on predators only harms the law abiding.
One final point on this new law is that it may enhance the number of pleadings to lesser charges. Using “government speak”, this will mean that politicians will be able to point to a decrease in more serious crimes. Everyone except the average citizen is a winner.
Use the link below for more details.
https://manhattan.institute/article/california-finds-a-new-way-to-be-soft-on-crime
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