African American men serve longer prison sentences than white men who have committed the same crime, according to new study by the US government.
Black men are imprisoned on average 19 percent longer than white men for similar crimes, the study by the US Sentencing Commission shows.
The racial disparity in sentencing can’t be accounted for by whether an offender has a history of violence, according to the study by the commission, an independent agency that is part of the US judicial branch.
The report is an analysis of demographic prison data collected from 2012 until 2016.
“Violence in an offender’s criminal history does not appear to contribute to the sentence imposed,” the report said.
Black men received sentences that were on average 20.4 percent longer than that of white men when accounting for violence in an offender’s past, according to the commission’s analysis.
The findings also suggest that judges were more likely to pass down…