Lawful
Less Is More? Detecting Lies in Veiled Witnesses
Amy-May Leach et al.
Law and Human Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
Judges in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada have ruled that witnesses may not wear the niqab - a type of face veil - when testifying, in part because they believed that it was necessary to see a person's face to detect deception (Muhammad v. Enterprise Rent-A-Car, 2006; R. v. N. S., 2010; The Queen v. D(R), 2013). In two studies, we used conventional research methods and safeguards to empirically examine the assumption that niqabs interfere with lie detection. Female witnesses were randomly assigned to lie or tell the truth while remaining unveiled or while wearing a hijab (i.e., a head veil) or a niqab (i.e., a face veil). In Study 1, laypersons in Canada (N = 232) were more accurate at detecting deception in witnesses who wore niqabs or hijabs than in those who did not wear veils. Concealing portions of witnesses' faces led laypersons to change their decision-making strategies without eliciting negative biases. Lie detection results were partially replicated in Study 2, with laypersons in Canada, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands (N = 291): observers' performance was better when witnesses wore either niqabs or hijabs than when witnesses did not wear veils. These findings suggest that, contrary to judicial opinion, niqabs do not interfere with - and may, in fact, improve - the ability to detect deception.
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The Heavy Costs of High Bail: Evidence from Judge Randomization
Arpit Gupta, Christopher Hansman & Ethan Frenchman
Columbia University Working Paper, May 2016
Abstract:
Roughly 450,000 people are detained awaiting trial on any given day, typically because bail has not been posted. Using a large sample of criminal cases in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, we analyze the consequences of bail assessment and pretrial detentions by exploiting the variation in bail setting tendencies among randomly assigned bail judges. Our estimates suggest that the assignment of money bail leads to a 6 percentage point rise in the likelihood of pleading guilty, and a 4 percentage point rise in recidivism. We also find evidence for racial bias in bail setting. Our results highlight the importance of credit constraints in shaping defendant judicial outcomes and point to important fairness considerations in the institutional design of pretrial detention programs.
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Frank Baumgartner et al.
Politics, Groups, and Identities, forthcoming
Abstract:
North Carolina mandated the first collection of demographic data on all traffic stops during a surge of attention to the phenomenon of "driving while black" in the late 1990s. Based on analysis of over 18 million traffic stops, we show dramatic disparities in the rates at which black drivers, particularly young males, are searched and arrested as compared to similarly situated whites, women, or older drivers. Further, the degree of racial disparity is growing over time. Finally, the rate at which searches lead to the discovery of contraband is consistently lower for blacks than for whites, providing strong evidence that the empirical disparities we uncover are in fact evidence of racial bias. The findings are robust to a variety of statistical specifications and consistent with findings in other jurisdictions.
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The Interdependence of Perceived Confession Voluntariness and Case Evidence
Rachel Greenspan & Nicholas Scurich
Law and Human Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
The current research investigated the mechanisms by which perceptions of confession evidence both influence and are influenced by perceptions of other case evidence using the theoretical framework of coherence-based reasoning (CBR). CBR posits that ambiguity and uncertainty are eschewed by artificially imposing consistency between pieces of evidence through bidirectional reasoning: Inferences about evidence lead to a preferred verdict, which in turn radiates backward to influence the perception of evidence. Two studies tested the CBR account with regard to confessions. An online sample of participants evaluated confession and nonconfession evidence at pretest and posttest. Study 1 revealed that, during pretest, participants (N = 119) deemed the evidence independent and nonprobative and the confession to be voluntary. However, at posttest, in the context of a criminal trial, participants considered the same evidence interrelated and highly inculpatory or exculpatory, depending on their verdict. Moreover, participants who voted to convict deemed the confession substantially voluntary, whereas participants who voted to acquit deemed it involuntary. Study 2 experimentally manipulated the strength of the nonconfession evidence in an effort to push participants (N = 127) toward a particular verdict. The same patterns of results emerged but were conditional on the strength of the nonconfession evidence: Strong case evidence caused the confession to be perceived as more voluntary, despite the fact that the confession was held constant. These findings replicate the coherence effect in a new domain and suggest that judges conducting harmless error analysis or making admissibility decisions might underappreciate the impact of confession evidence on jurors' verdicts.
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Group Threat, Police Officer Diversity and the Deadly Use of Police Force
Joscha Legewie & Jeffrey Fagan
Columbia University Working Paper, May 2016
Abstract:
Officer-involved killings and racial bias in policing are controversial political issues. Prior research indicates that (perceived) group threat measured in terms of population shares and race-specific crime rates are important explanations for variations in police killings across cities in the the United States. We argue that a diverse police force that proportionally represents the population it serves mitigates group threat and thereby reduces the number of officer-involved killings. Count models support our argument. They show that officer involved killings of African Americans are higher in cities with factors commonly associated with group threat, including ethnic/racial polarization and black-on-white homicides. A diverse police force, however, reduces the influence of group threat lowering the number of officer-involved killings of African Americans. The findings represent one of the first analysis of a highly relevant contemporary issue based on a recent and high-quality dataset from 2013 to 2015. By highlighting the interaction between group treat and the proportional representation of minority groups in police departments, our research advances group conflict and threat theories with important theoretical and policy implications for law enforcement and representative bureaucracies more broadly.
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Melissa Logue
Race and Justice, forthcoming
Abstract:
The present study was an intragroup examination of noncitizen Latino drug traffickers convicted in the federal courts from 2006 to 2014. Drawing upon focal concerns theory and Sayad's state-centered perspective on the role of governments in framing the crime-immigration debate, this study assessed whether offenders' national origin conditions the effects of immigration status on the odds of receiving a downward departure (lenient sentencing) and the magnitude of the sentence discount imposed. Particular attention was paid to whether any effects worked to the detriment of Mexicans relative to non-Mexicans. The findings revealed that the effect of immigration status was contingent on offenders' national origin for the departure decision, but not the sentence discount. While being undocumented served to decrease the odds of a downward departure regardless of national origin, the effects were greater for Mexicans than for non-Mexicans. These findings indicate that contrary to the goals of the U.S. sentencing guidelines to reduce unwarranted disparities surrounding national origin, the current federal sentencing structure allows them to thrive.
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A Wise Latina or a Baffled Rookie? Media Coverage of Justice Sonia Sotomayor's Ascent to the Bench
Terri Towner & Rosalee Clawson
Journal of Women, Politics & Policy, Summer 2016, Pages 316-340
Abstract:
We examine newspaper coverage of the US Supreme Court confirmation process to investigate whether Sonia Sotomayor received different coverage than other nominees due to her status as a minority woman. Sotomayor was the only justice seated over the last three decades who received extensive attention to her race and gender, and her coverage was more negatively toned than that received by other nominees. Compared to her counterparts, the press downplayed her intellectual abilities, devoted more negative attention to her judicial temperament, and suggested she would struggle to adjust to her new role. We examine explanations for why Sotomayor received different coverage and conclude that the intersectionality of ethnicity and gender best explains the media's characterization of her.
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The Perfect Match: Do Criminal Stereotypes Bias Forensic Evidence Analysis?
Laura Smalarz et al.
Law and Human Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
This research provided the first empirical test of the hypothesis that stereotypes bias evaluations of forensic evidence. A pilot study (N = 107) assessed the content and consensus of 20 criminal stereotypes by identifying perpetrator characteristics (e.g., sex, race, age, religion) that are stereotypically associated with specific crimes. In the main experiment (N = 225), participants read a mock police incident report involving either a stereotyped crime (child molestation) or a nonstereotyped crime (identity theft) and judged whether a suspect's fingerprint matched a fingerprint recovered at the crime scene. Accompanying the suspect's fingerprint was personal information about the suspect of the type that is routinely available to fingerprint analysts (e.g., race, sex) and which could activate a stereotype. Participants most often perceived the fingerprints to match when the suspect fit the criminal stereotype, even though the prints did not actually match. Moreover, participants appeared to be unaware of the extent to which a criminal stereotype had biased their evaluations. These findings demonstrate that criminal stereotypes are a potential source of bias in forensic evidence analysis and suggest that suspects who fit criminal stereotypes may be disadvantaged over the course of the criminal justice process.
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The biasing effect of the "sexually violent predator" label on legal decisions
Nicholas Scurich, Jennifer Gongola & Daniel Krauss
International Journal of Law and Psychiatry, forthcoming
Abstract:
Public fear has driven legislation designed to identify and exclude sexual offenders from society, culminating in sexually violent predator (SVP) statutes, in which a sex offender who has served his prison sentence is hospitalized indefinitely if a jury determines that he is likely to reoffend as a result of a mental disorder. Jurors rarely vote not to commit a previously-convicted sex offender as an SVP. This study tests whether the mere label of "sexually violent predator" affects these legal decisions. Venire jurors (n = 161) were asked to decide whether an individual who had been incarcerated for 16 years should be released on parole. The individual was either labeled as a.) a sexually violent predator or b.) a convicted felon, and all other information was identical between the conditions. Jurors were over twice as likely to deny parole to the SVP compared to the felon, even though they did not consider him any more dangerous or any more likely to reoffend. Demographic variables did not moderate this finding. However, jurors' desire to 'get revenge' and to 'make the offender pay', as measured by Gerber and Jackson's (2013) Just Deserts Scale, did significantly relate to decisions to deny parole. These findings suggest that jurors' decisions in SVP hearings are driven by legally impermissible considerations, and that the mere label of "sexually violent predator" induces bias into the decision making process.
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The Two Opposing Effects of Judicial Elections on Legitimacy Perceptions
Benjamin Woodson
State Politics & Policy Quarterly, forthcoming
Abstract:
Judicial elections have two opposing effects on legitimacy perceptions for state supreme courts. Elections not only provide a boost to legitimacy through the chance to hold officials accountable but also involve campaign activity that decreases legitimacy perceptions. This article examines these two opposing effects using a nationally representative survey that includes items assessing diffuse support for state supreme courts. It uses multiple indicators to differentiate between states with highly active election systems involving large amounts of campaign activity and states with less active elections systems that involve little campaign activity. The results from the survey show that the legitimacy of elected courts is higher than appointed courts but only in states with little election activity. In states with high amounts of election activity, the legitimacy of elected courts is lower than appointed courts.
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Evaluating the privacy properties of telephone metadata
Jonathan Mayer, Patrick Mutchler & John Mitchell
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 17 May 2016, Pages 5536-5541
Abstract:
Since 2013, a stream of disclosures has prompted reconsideration of surveillance law and policy. One of the most controversial principles, both in the United States and abroad, is that communications metadata receives substantially less protection than communications content. Several nations currently collect telephone metadata in bulk, including on their own citizens. In this paper, we attempt to shed light on the privacy properties of telephone metadata. Using a crowdsourcing methodology, we demonstrate that telephone metadata is densely interconnected, can trivially be reidentified, and can be used to draw sensitive inferences.
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Magna Carta: The Rule of Law in Early Common Law Litigation
Thomas Lund
International Review of Law and Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
Activist judges are often accused of changing the rule of law into the rule of men. Some Americans are disturbed by U. S. Supreme Court decisions that create new law, invade state sovereignty, and impose recent standards for sexual conduct. The fourteenth century Court of Common Pleas invented the heretical doctrine that judges have the power to change law. The medieval court implemented new rules, ignored the plain meaning of legislation, and undermined Magna Carta guarantees. This paper explains how a head-strong judge seized power, and violated traditional respect for the rule of law. His innovations are discussed in the context of American judicial activism.
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The saliency of gestural misinformation in the perception of a violent crime
Daniel Gurney, Louise Ellis & Emily Vardon-Hynard
Psychology, Crime & Law, Summer 2016, Pages 651-665
Abstract:
Recent research has revealed that misinformation from gestures can influence eyewitness memory. However, it is still unclear whether gestural misinformation can emulate the effects of verbal misinformation on the reporting of major details in serious crimes. To investigate the salience of suggestions provided nonverbally, and how these compare to those made verbally, two experiments were conducted. In Experiment 1, participants watched footage of a crime scene and were presented with one of two types of gestures during questioning that suggested different interpretations of the crime. The results confirmed that the gestures influenced responses, with participants altering their interpretation of the crime according to the information gestured to them. Experiment 2 built on this to investigate how comparable gestural influence was to verbal influence. The results revealed that gestural misinformation caused participants to alter their interpretation of the crime and elicited the same effects as verbal misinformation. Across the two experiments, participants were unlikely to identify the misleading gestures or report feeling misled by them. These results reveal new insights into the strength of gestural misinformation and show that, despite their subtle nature in communication, gestures can exert a powerful influence in eyewitness interviews.
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Christian Burset
Law and History Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
This article offers the first explanation of why Britain, unlike other major European economic powers, did not create merchant courts in the eighteenth century, and instead chose to resolve commercial disputes either through litigation in "ordinary" courts or through arbitration. From the Restoration until the 1750s, lawyers successfully resisted the development of merchant courts in order to protect their monopoly on litigation. (Such courts did emerge in the colonies, however, where the legal profession was less powerful.) In the 1760s, the need for a merchant court became more acute, as litigation levels rose, legal costs skyrocketed, and some merchants complained that existing methods of arbitration were inadequate. But just as merchant courts offered the greatest practical appeal, political polarization impeded institutional innovation, as radical Whigs became increasing unyielding in their opposition to any new court that might undermine civil juries. Meanwhile, various improvements in common law litigation, especially the expanded use of merchant juries, reduced pressure for more fundamental reform and allowed political concerns to predominate. As a result, an enduring fiction emerged that in the Anglo-American legal tradition, litigants resolved their disputes either privately or before courts of general jurisdiction - a fiction that continues to shape our assumptions about civil litigation.
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Strategic Anticipation of En Banc Review in the U.S. Courts of Appeals
Rachael Hinkle
Law & Society Review, June 2016, Pages 383-414
Abstract:
The quest for empirical evidence of strategic judicial behavior has produced mixed results. This study finds such evidence in the decisions made while crafting an opinion. Central to any opinion is which precedents are cited and whether their scope is limited (negative treatment) or expanded (positive treatment). I look for evidence of strategic anticipation of en banc review in these decisions using an original dataset of published search and seizure cases from the U.S. Courts of Appeals from 1953 to 2010. A panel is less likely to negatively treat a precedent with which the full circuit is more closely aligned. Circuit preferences also have an effect on citation itself, but only when the panel is at least moderately aligned with a precedent. Moreover, the panel's own ideology is only a significant predictor of citation when the full circuit is favorably disposed toward a particular precedent.
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The Impact of Police Deployment on Racial Disparities in Discretionary Searches
Steven Briggs & Kelsey Keimig
Race and Justice, forthcoming
Abstract:
A large and growing body of research finds racial disparities in discretionary searches of drivers during traffic stops with Black drivers disproportionately involved in these investigations. Among the explanations for these disparities is the deployment hypothesis which suggests that as police departments increasingly adopt hot spots policing strategies, proactive traffic stops and discretionary searches may spatially cluster around crime hot spots contributing to racial disparities. The present study builds on the existing research literature by identifying hot spots using reported crime data from a police department and examining whether these crime hot spots function as a mediating factor to the relationship between driver race and discretionary searches. Findings provide partial support for the deployment hypothesis. While nearly half of all traffic stops transpired within one quarter mile of hot spots and more frequently involved Black drivers, stops involving Black drivers remained more likely to include discretionary searches and increased concomitantly with distance from the nearest hot spot.
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Police Endorse Color-Blind Racial Beliefs More Than Laypersons
Cris Hughes et al.
Race and Social Problems, June 2016, Pages 160-170
Abstract:
Racial disparities in the US criminal justice system (CJS) have been extensively documented in scholarly work. Critical race scholars have suggested that color-blind racial attitudes inform the set of beliefs that CJS practitioners use in decision making. If this is the case, factors that are related to color-blind racial attitude trends in CJS practitioners must be better understood. We focus on a single CJS practitioner - the police - to assess their color-blind racial beliefs and compare these to the broader US public. Using the Color-Blind Racial Attitudes Scale (CoBRAS), we identified sociodemographic variables associated with high CoBRAS scores in a multiracial lay sample (N = 1401; males and females, mean age = 33.4 years). Police (N = 112) and police recruits (N = 52) CoBRAS scores were compared to CoBRAS scores of lay participants with similar sociodemographics as the police and recruit samples, (respectively, N = 451; N = 291). Police scored significantly higher on the CoBRAS than laypersons even when controlling for sociodemographic variables. Police recruits also have higher CoBRAS scores than laypersons, again controlling for sociodemographic variables. These findings suggest that police work attracts people who endorse color-blind racial beliefs. These findings make understanding the relationship between color-blind racial beliefs and discriminatory behavior of CJS practitioners imperative.