TY - JOUR
T1 - A culture that is hard to defend
T2 - Extralegal factors in federal death penalty cases
AU - Gould, Jon B.
AU - Leon, Kenneth Sebastian
N1 - Funding Information:
* Professor of Public Affairs and Law, American University. A.B., University of Michigan; J.D. and M.P.P., Harvard University; PhD., University of Chicago. ** V sitingiAssistantProfessor,GeorgeWashington University.B.S.,FloridaStateUniversity; M.A., George Washington University; PhD., American nUiversity. The authors thank Lisa Greenman for assistance on the research report that preceded this analysis and for reviewing an earlier version of this article; Edward Maguire and Thomas Zeitzoff for statistical assistance; and Ben Fleury-Steiner for comments on an earlier draft. Research was funded in part by the National Science Foundation. All opinions and conclusions are those of the authors.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 by Jon B. Gould & Kenneth Sebastian Leon.
PY - 2017
Y1 - 2017
N2 - Empirical research has exposed a troubling pattern of capital punishment in the United States, with extralegal factors such as race, class, and gender strongly correlated with the probability of a death sentence. Capital sentencing also shows significant geographic disparities, although existing research tends to be more descriptive than explanatory. This study offers an alternative conception of local legal culture to explain place-based variation in the outcomes of federal capital trials, accounting for the level of attorney time and expert resources granted by the federal courts to defend against a death sentence. Using frequentist and Bayesian methods—supplemented with expert interviews—we empirically assess the processes determining the total allocation of defense resources in federal death penalty trials at the peak of the federal death penalty—between 1998 and 2004. Our findings strongly connect extralegal factors to the lowest levels of defense resources, which in turn correlate with a higher risk of a death sentence. Far from being idiosyncratic discrepancies, these are systemic and systematic extralegal factors that stand between a defendant and his opportunity to defend against a death sentence. Ultimately, we argue for a reconceptualization of extralegal influences and the relationship between local legal culture and capital case outcomes.
AB - Empirical research has exposed a troubling pattern of capital punishment in the United States, with extralegal factors such as race, class, and gender strongly correlated with the probability of a death sentence. Capital sentencing also shows significant geographic disparities, although existing research tends to be more descriptive than explanatory. This study offers an alternative conception of local legal culture to explain place-based variation in the outcomes of federal capital trials, accounting for the level of attorney time and expert resources granted by the federal courts to defend against a death sentence. Using frequentist and Bayesian methods—supplemented with expert interviews—we empirically assess the processes determining the total allocation of defense resources in federal death penalty trials at the peak of the federal death penalty—between 1998 and 2004. Our findings strongly connect extralegal factors to the lowest levels of defense resources, which in turn correlate with a higher risk of a death sentence. Far from being idiosyncratic discrepancies, these are systemic and systematic extralegal factors that stand between a defendant and his opportunity to defend against a death sentence. Ultimately, we argue for a reconceptualization of extralegal influences and the relationship between local legal culture and capital case outcomes.
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M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85032690193
SN - 0091-4169
VL - 107
SP - 643
EP - 686
JO - Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
JF - Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
IS - 4
M1 - 3
ER -