Review Finds White Drug Defendants 55% More Likely to Have Charges Reduced
Cleveland Plain Dealer
Bob Paynter
10/20/2008
Prosecutor Bill Mason and his staff are a large part of the racial disparity in drug sentencing, according to research.
Why did Kevin McFaul, white and the son of the county sheriff, get off with a misdemeanor conviction last year in his cocaine-possession case — potentially preserving his law license — while Mercia Cherry, a black resident of Cleveland’s East Side, had to take a felony in hers?
[...]
The newspaper reported Sunday that among first-time offenders who pleaded guilty last year to a single felony drug-possession charge, white defendants were 35 percent more likely than black people to get a second chance to make their pleas and charges disappear by successfully completing a treatment plan.
Court records show that virtually all of that racial disparity occurred in something called the Early Intervention Program, the control of which remains somewhat mysterious.
Judges and defense attorneys said in interviews that the program has come to be controlled by Prosecutor Bill Mason’s office over the years, an assertion prosecutors dismiss.
[...]
Among all defendants indicted in Cuyahoga County on a single, low-level drug-possession charge over the last four years who were convicted after pleading guilty, white people were 55 percent more likely than black people to have their charges reduced to a misdemeanor.
[...][Public defender Robert Tobik] has been arguing for years that more entry-level drug offenders should be allowed misdemeanor pleas, especially in crack-pipe “residue” cases like Cherry’s, which typically involve mere chemical traces of cocaine.
These residue cases clog the system and waste the court’s resources, Tobik said; several judges have made similar arguments. But to no avail:
Misdemeanors have actually become harder — not easier — to come by in Common Pleas Court.[...]
On the matter of misdemeanor pleas, prosecutor protests notwithstanding, it appears from the data to help if you live in the suburbs or outside the area.
It helps even more if you’re from out of town and white.