Legal System

Since slavery the U.S. legal system has considered mass incarceration as a criminal justice issue when in fact it’s a civil rights and racial justice crisis that has devastated the Black community.
  • The crack cocaine epidemic that began in 1980 affected primarily Black households and was treated as a crime, while the current opioid epidemic is being treated as a health crisis.
  • Between 1980 and 2015, the number of people incarcerated increased from roughly 500,000 to 2.2. million.
  • One out of every 3 Black boys born today can expect to be sentenced to prison, compared with 1 out of 6 Latino boys, and 1 out of 17 White boys.
  • African Americans are incarcerated at more than five times the rate of Whites.
  • The imprisonment rate for African American women is twice that of White women.
  • Nationwide, African American children represent 32% of children who are arrested, 42% of children who are detained, and 52% of children whose cases are judicially waived to criminal court.
  • If African Americans and Hispanics were incarcerated at the same rates as Whites, prison and jail populations would decline by almost 40%.

Source: National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)
https://www.naacp.org/criminal-justice-fact-sheet/