Defining Sentence Type: Further Evidence Against Use of the Total Incarceration Variable

• NCJ Number: 217095
• Journal: Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency Volume: 44 Issue: 1 Dated: February 2007 Pages: 36-63
• Author(s): Michael P. Harrington; Cassia Spohn
• Date Published: February 2007
• Length: 28 pages
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Report (Study/Research)
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This study replicated and extended the research of Holleran and Spohn (2004), who examined the effects of legal and extralegal factors in felony sentencing.

Abstract

The findings of the current study provide compelling evidence in support of Holleran and Spohn's contention that "separating jail sentences from prison sentences enhances our understanding of the sentencing process and the factors that affect the sentences that judges impose." The current study's findings show that the type of sentence imposed by judges reflected both legally relevant case characteristics and legally irrelevant offender characteristics. Regarding the latter effect, Black offenders were less likely than White offenders to be sentenced to probation rather than jail for similar offenses and legally relevant variables; however, Black offenders were less likely than White offenders to be sentenced to prison rather than jail. This confirms Holleran and Spohn's finding that factors affecting jail sentences were different from those that affected prison sentences, as well as their conclusion that offender characteristics such as race and ethnicity differed in their influence according to the way the sentence is defined. Further, the above finding in the current research referred only to male offenders. Female offenders of both races were more likely than male offenders of either race to receive probation, and they were less likely than males to receive jail or prison sentences. This study examined the sentencing decisions of judges in an urban county in the Midwestern United States. It applied the methods used by Holleran and Spohn in their examination of sentencing decisions in a jurisdiction with mandatory sentencing guidelines; however, the current study was conducted in a jurisdiction without sentencing guidelines. The data included information on all felony offenders bound over for trial in the county's district court in 2001. The final sample involved 1,487 cases. 4 tables, 7 notes, and 35 references