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Defense Attorney Plea Recommendations and Client Race: Does Zealous Representation Apply Equally to All?

  • Original Article
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Law and Human Behavior

Abstract

Research on racism in the criminal justice system generally focuses on the role of the jury; yet, the vast majority of convictions are obtained through plea bargains. This research addresses the role of the defense attorney and proposes that disparities in sentence length and incarceration rates between African Americans and Caucasian Americans are in part due to the plea bargains that defense attorneys recommend these clients accept. Using practicing defense attorneys from around the country, findings indicate that the pleas attorneys felt they could obtain with a minority client contained higher sentences (adjusted M = 2.88) than those they felt they could obtain with a Caucasian client (adjusted M = 2.22) and were significantly more likely to include some jail time. Reasons for the disparate recommendations were not due to increased perceptions of guilt with the minority client nor to perceptions that the minority client would fare worse at trial. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed as well as possible future directions.

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Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Kristina deBlanc and Lindsey Lee for assisting in data collection and providing feedback during material construction.

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  1. Department of Psychology, Florida Institute of Technology, Melbourne, FL, 32901, USA

    Vanessa A. Edkins

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  1. Vanessa A. Edkins
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Correspondence to Vanessa A. Edkins.

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Edkins, V.A. Defense Attorney Plea Recommendations and Client Race: Does Zealous Representation Apply Equally to All?. Law Hum Behav 35, 413–425 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10979-010-9254-0

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