Call it out: racial bias.

We’ve got to keep talking about race.

The outpouring of emotion in response to the Zimmerman trial has re-energized an essential conversation about race in this country.  It has created a moment, an opportunity to chip away at resistance to this conversation.

I have experienced hostility in response to bringing up race in the criminal justice system. I have been accused of playing “the race card” when talking about race with jurors who say “we’re past all that” and resist talking about it. Wrong. We need to keep talking about it.

As discussed eloquently here  (by Prof. Noah Feldman at 1:30), criminal trials do not address social problems. Trials address legal questions that are narrowed as much as possible to analyze the evidence presented. But the Zimmerman trial is causing people to examine the role of race in the criminal justice system.  About time.

Racial bias pervades the criminal justice system. It is evident in crime perception,  arrest rates and sentencing nationwide.  A groundbreaking report issued this week, “Criminal Justice in the 21st Century: Eliminating Racial and Ethnic Disparities in the Criminal Justice System", concludes that change  “will require prosecutors, defense attorneys and judges to recognize the influence of race in the criminal justice system, and for defense attorneys in particular to call it out in court.”

This is an important part of our obligation as public defenders: open, frank discussion with jurors about race. 

Jurors are called upon to decide whether certain actions or intentions were reasonable.  If enough people in our society believe that it is reasonable to fear an unarmed teenager, based only on the observation that he is black and wearing a hoodie, we will continue to see that racially biased sentiment reflected in arrests, jury verdicts and sentencing. 

Race can't be the unspoken part of the case, the elephant in the room. We need to call it out in court.