Prison Policy Initiative

Report: Blacks Seven-Times More Likely than Whites to Be Wrongfully Convicted of Murder

“From their very first interaction with the police, to being arrested, booked, charged, convicted, and sentenced, Black people are discriminated against and disproportionately criminalized at every stage of the criminal justice system,” according to the Innocence Project report, #BlackBehindBars: Sparking a conversation on the Black wrongful conviction experience in the U.S.

SPECIAL REPORT: Mass Incarceration of Women and Minorities a New Crisis

Courtesy The Marshall Project/PBS Although the number of people in prisons and jails in America has slightly declined, numbers released on Thursday, April 25, by the Bureau of Justice Statistics still show that nearly 1.5 million individuals were in prison by the end of 2017. The statistics also note that the U.S. continues to lock up more people than any other nation. And, despite a narrowing disparity between incarcerated black and white women, females have emerged as the new face of mass incarceration. “I don’t think this should be much of a surprise as two of the main for-profit prison