1. The NYT is the worst newspaper in the country. They regularly lie.
2. You can make statistics say anything you want.
3. The real crime against the poor is the intercity school systems. The path out of poverty is education and the poor are denied a decent education by the democratic run cities.

If you want to be upset, at least pick the right issue.

The study is about the value of the victims, not the value of the killers.

Again - it doesn't matter what color the killers are, in the context of THIS topic. There could be 20 black killers, 20 white killers, and 60 Native American killers -

the end result is STILL that if the victim was black, those killers will receive, on average, a less severe punishment than if the victim was white.

I have the solution to the problem. If someone commits murder they are executed for it. Totally levels the field.

This study linked by the OP is a study advancing the work done by Professor David Baldus, et al., in 1983. Baldus researched death penalty convictions and executions in Georgia during the 1970's, and found disparities in the racial makeup of those actually executed, based on whether a murder victim was black or white.

First, the time period here was the 1970's. One can only hope that things might be different today than over 40 years ago in Georgia.

I read this paper. We all see things through the our own biases and filters, of course, but I did find the authors jumped through some hoops to make their case at times. For example, they reclassified / modified the stats on a person executed for killing a black individual because that person had also killed a white individual. In actuality, the killer (William Henry Hance) killed two black women and one white woman, and was first sentenced to death for killing one of the black women. That sentence was overturned, but later a resentencing occurred.

The authors go on to say that whenever a white victim is involved, the police response is going to be much greater, and hence a nationwide manhunt ensued to find the killer.

Here's how they justify modifying this "black murder victim" to, instead, a "white murder victim":

"In a technical sense, Hance was sentenced to death and executed for a “case” involving a Black victim, Gail Jackson. In a practical sense, though, Hance’s “case” included three victims who were killed in the same manner during a crime spree, one of whom was a white woman. Considering the facts outlined above, we believe it is appropriate to treat Hance as a white victim case. Such a conclusion is consistent with social science research which has shown that executing an offender for a transgression against a “different victim” is not unprecedented."

The authors later agree that aggravating circumstances in the different murder cases could, in fact, result in why some were eventually executed for their murders and some not. Yet they then go to great lengths to try and quantify various aggravating factors that would portend why an execution would be warranted. It was kind of like you get one point for this factor, one point for that factor, etc. And, not surprisingly, they concluded that the aggravating factors of the cases weren't sufficient to warrant the difference in why more people were executed for white victim deaths than black victim deaths.

At the very start of the study, they state that anyone being executed for a capital crime in this country is quite rare:

"An unexpected feature of the modern death penalty is the fact that most persons sentenced to death are not executed. Between 1973 and June of 2019, more than 8,000 persons have been sentenced to death, but about 1,500 persons have been executed. Death sentences are remarkably poor predictors of who will ultimately be executed."

That's ~32 people / year who have been put to death.

I do take issue with the "17 times more likely to be executed" mantras. The numbers involved in both the original Baldus study and this one are, by any reading, quite small. If you had $17 and I had $1, I'm pretty sure neither of us would be rich.

I think that some things that studies like these can't really address are variables that are just different in the cases involved.

Were these trials/sentences all conducted in the same court with the same judge and jury? Of course not.

Were the murders in question all similar in the manner in which the victims were killed? Very doubtful. In the end, a life or lives were taken, to be sure. But that's not how juries and judges are going to evaluate them. Was a victim shot? Was a victim kidnapped/raped/killed? You get the picture...and I'm sure I don't have to go into more gory details. Different cases present details that juries and judges are going to evaluate both objectively (to the extent possible) and emotionally. We're all human.

That doesn't mean there's never a racial component in how justice is meted out, and I'm not making that argument. But statistics in and of themselves don't tell a full story. And yes, sometimes those full stories can further a study's conclusions. Sometimes, though, they might add more context where stats in and of themselves can't paint a clear picture of what happened.

Do black lives matter?
 

Do black lives matter?

According to this research, black lives sometimes matter, but white lives matter 17 times more than black lives.

I believe that MLK said that the arc of history moves toward the good and the positive. I hope that eventually proves out.

You will have to wait for A.I and Robotics to improve to create "Robo-cops" for tripling law enforcement to be cost effective. No one today wants their property and other taxes raised.

Agree, and do it in timely manner not 20 plus years after the fact.

Yes the study of specific results is now proven which out doubt facts.

13% of the population commit 84% of the crimes. Can you figure that out.

Please do better research. This was a very easy find on the race of the person executed. The Times is leaning the article toward their viewpoint and is hardly unbiased.

White criminals are executed more than black criminals. The victim comparison would included black on black crimes with gang on gang included. The shooter is less likely to get the death penalty for shooting another gang member shooting at him.

62% of white victims are violated by white criminals. 70% of black victims are violated by black criminals. According to your study the criminals violating black victims are not getting executed at a high enough rate however, 70% are black criminals. If those that violated black victims are facing a higher execution rate there would be people complaining black criminals are getting executed much more.

Executions by Race and Race of Victim | Death Penalty Information Center

https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/cv18.pdf

post by Good Life Best and most honest post yet

What a brilliant man Martín Luther King was. He truly walked in the path of Jesus Christ. Thank you for this post.

I am against the death penalty because it takes too long.