Court Workforce Racial Diversity and Racial Justice in Criminal Case Outcomes in the United States, 2000-2005 (ICPSR 25423)
Version Date: Jun 25, 2009 View help for published
Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s)
Geoff Ward, Northeastern University. College of Criminal Justice;
Amy Farrell, Northeastern University. College of Criminal Justice;
Danielle Rousseau, Northeastern University. College of Criminal Justice
https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR25423.v1
Version V1
Summary View help for Summary
The purpose of this study was to determine whether workgroup racial composition is related to sentence outcomes generally, and racial differences in sentencing in particular, across federal districts. This collection contains information on federal court district characteristics. Data include information about the social context, court context, and diversity of the courtroom workgroup for 90 federal judicial districts provided by 50 judicial district context variables.
Citation View help for Citation
Export Citation:
Funding View help for Funding
Subject Terms View help for Subject Terms
Geographic Coverage View help for Geographic Coverage
Smallest Geographic Unit View help for Smallest Geographic Unit
federal criminal court district
Distributor(s) View help for Distributor(s)
Time Period(s) View help for Time Period(s)
Date of Collection View help for Date of Collection
Data Collection Notes View help for Data Collection Notes
-
Individual level variables, including the individual defendant case decisions that were obtained through the Monitoring Federal Criminal Sentencing (MFCS) data acquired from the United States Sentencing Commission, are not available as part of this collection.
Study Purpose View help for Study Purpose
Race and criminal sentencing research typically considers only the race of the criminal offender, crime victim, and general population to assess whether and how race influences sentencing and outcomes. Invisible in most accounts are the racial identities and group relations of court workers whose decisions ultimately shape case outcomes, and thus the race relations of sentencing. The purpose of this study was to determine whether workgroup racial composition is related to sentence outcomes generally, and racial differences in sentencing in particular, across federal districts.
Study Design View help for Study Design
This collection contains information on federal court district characteristics. Data include information about the social context, court context, and diversity of the courtroom workgroup for 90 federal judicial districts. Information on the social context of the judicial district was compiled using information from the 2000 Census and the 2000 Uniform Crime Reports (available through the FedStats system). Information specific to the court context including data on case processing, court workload information, demographics of each district, arrest data for each district, caseload, criminal case processing time, and proportion of district caseload for different types of crimes was obtained through the Federal Court Management Statistics and the Judicial Business of the United States Courts for 2000 and 2001, which are compiled annually by the Administrative Office of the United States Courts. Information on the racial demographics of federal court workgroups was collected by the principal investigators. Publicly available data on judge demographics and background was found at the Federal Judicial Center's Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, information on the demographics of federal prosecutors was provided from FedStats, and data on the demographics of federal probation officers and defenders was provided by the Administrative Offices of the United States Trial Courts.
Sample View help for Sample
The sample is comprised of 90 of the 94 judicial districts in the federal court system. Four districts (Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands, Guam, and North Mariana Island) were eliminated due to insufficient data available and concern about variation in territorial governance over judicial processes.
Universe View help for Universe
All federal judicial districts in the United States between 2000 and 2005.
Unit(s) of Observation View help for Unit(s) of Observation
Data Source View help for Data Source
Data sources include the 2000 Census, the 2000 Uniform Crime Reports, the Federal Court Management Statistics and the Judicial Business of the United States Courts for 2000 and 2001, which are compiled annually by the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, the Federal Judicial Center's Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, FedStats, and the Administrative Offices of the United States Trial Courts.
Data Type(s) View help for Data Type(s)
Mode of Data Collection View help for Mode of Data Collection
Description of Variables View help for Description of Variables
The dataset contains 50 judicial district context variables. More specifically, variables include district, population, proportion male/female judges in district, proportion White/Black/Hispanic judges in district, proportion male/female probation officers in district, proportion White/Black/Hispanic probation officers in district, proportion male/female prosecutors in district, proportion White/Black/Hispanic prosecutors in district, proportion male/female defenders in district, proportion White/Black/Hispanic defenders in district, proportion district population White/Black/Hispanic, departure rate for district, proportion district under 18 years of age, proportion of district over 65 years of age, proportion of district unemployed, proportion of district below poverty level, average filing time for district, violent offense rate for district, average felony finding per judge, proportion C felony finding, proportion F felony finding, proportion Black defendant for district. Other variables include Black workgroup (judge and prosecutors only), Black judge index, Black probation index, Black prosecutor index, Black defender index, Black workgroup index-original (judge + prosecutor), proportion of judges in district appointed by democratic/republican presidents, indicator that district is in southern region, female workgroup, full Black workgroup (judge, prosecutor, probation, and defender), and full workgroup index (judge, prosecutor, probation, defender).
Response Rates View help for Response Rates
not applicable
Presence of Common Scales View help for Presence of Common Scales
none
HideOriginal Release Date View help for Original Release Date
2009-06-25
Version History View help for Version History
- Ward, Geoff, Amy Farrell, and Danielle Rousseau. Court Workforce Racial Diversity and Racial Justice in Criminal Case Outcomes in the United States, 2000-2005. ICPSR25423-v1. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2009-06-25. http://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR25423.v1
2009-06-25 ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:
- Standardized missing values.
- Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.
Notes
The public-use data files in this collection are available for access by the general public. Access does not require affiliation with an ICPSR member institution.