"The Herald-Tribune spent a year reviewing tens of millions of records in two state databases — one compiled by the...

"The Herald-Tribune spent a year reviewing tens of millions of records in two state databases — one compiled by the state’s court clerks that tracks criminal cases through every stage of the justice system and the other by the Florida Department of Corrections that notes points scored by felons at sentencing.

Reporters examined more than 85,000 criminal appeals, read through boxes of court documents and crossed the state to interview more than 100 legal experts, advocates and criminal defendants.

The newspaper also built a first-of-its-kind database of Florida’s criminal judges to compare sentencing patterns based on everything from a judge's age and previous work experience to race and political affiliation.

No news organization, university or government agency has ever done such a comprehensive study of sentences handed down by individual judges on a statewide scale."

Ah, rigtig journalistik!

http://projects.heraldtribune.com/bias/sentencing/ ⟲

Same background. Same crime. Different race. Different sentence.

Read Bias on the Bench, Sarasota Herald-Tribune?s exhaustive investigation of Florida?s broken sentencing system.