Systemic racism is a hot topic in California criminal law. Prominent is the long-pending writ petition that broadly attacks California’s death penalty system as racially discriminatory (Office of the State Public Defender v. Bonta). (See recently here.) Also particularly significant are the many matters seeking relief under California’s Racial Justice Act (here, here, and here) on the basis of racism in the justice system in general, not just in an individual case.
But, in assessing systemic racism, what is the “system” of relevance? The Supreme Court has indicated, and the RJA itself seems to provide, that the proper focus is not on the state as a whole, but on the county in which the complaining defendant is being or was prosecuted.
The RJA is violated when defendants of one race are charged, convicted, or sentenced more harshly than similarly situated defendants of other races “in the county where the convictions were sought or obtained” or “where the sentence was imposed.” (Emphasis added.) Probably because of the county-specific language, the court has been turning down defendants seeking relief based on statewide racial disparities, but ordering further proceedings in cases alleging discrimination in a specific county. Here are some examples.
Two months ago, the court denied a petition for review in In re Mency with Justices Goodwin Liu and Kelli Evans dissenting. (See here.) In their dissenting statement, they said the defendant was entitled to counsel because he had provided “uncontroverted statewide data showing significant racial disparities in sentencing Black defendants to [life without parole], along with data showing even greater disparities in sentencing Black youth to LWOP.” (Emphasis added.) But, even for Justices Liu and Evans, the statewide statistics were enough only to get a lawyer for further investigation, not to establish an RJA violation, because, they said, the RJA “seems to require county-level data.” (Similarly, see Justices Liu and Evans’s dissenting statement in In re Mendoza (see here).)
On the other hand, the court has been receptive to, and ordered further proceedings regarding, claims based on statistical data of racial disparities in “incarceration and arrest rates under the Three Strikes law in Ventura County” (see here), “Three Strikes sentences imposed in Los Angeles County” (see here, here, and here), “the imposition of gang enhancements in Monterey County” (see here), “Alameda County’s arrest and prison incarceration rates” (see here), “the imposition of Three Strikes sentences in Sacramento County” (see here), “the imposition of firearm enhancements in San Joaquin County” (see here), “the imposition of Three Strikes sentences in San Diego County” (see here), “sentencing under special circumstances law in Riverside County” (see here), “prison populations in various California counties and racial disparities in sentencing under the Three Strikes law” (see here), and “convictions and sentencing in Riverside County” (see here).
The justices seem to be in agreement that statewide racial disparities are an insufficient predicate for RJA relief. The county-specific view might carry over as well to their decision whether to allow the anti-death penalty writ petition to go forward.
Related:
Heavyweight writ petition asks Supreme Court to declare death penalty unconstitutional
Supreme Court sets up possible trials on systemic racism in California’s criminal justice system
Supreme Court puts off ruling on Racial Justice Act discovery issue
