Thomas J. Catalano and Abdul Hussein Jabari

Citing from the cases for Mr. Catalano and Mr. Jabari, the judge appeared to have made no considerations regarding family situations and community support. Therefore, the only consideration that the judge made regarded the positions and organizations served by the defendants. Literally, Mr. Catalano served a more critical position than Mr. Jabari possibly citing from the income earned. Thus, though their culpability was nearly equal, the judge decided to give a long probation sentence to Mr. Catalano and a shorter state prison detention to Mr. Jabari. The reason why the judge seemed not to consider family situations and community support is that Mr. Jabari had a bigger family but yet faced state prison detention. Additionally, Mr. Jabari had enough community support but this did not deter him from being incarcerated.

The first contention that can be raised by the judge in the support of his decisions in Mr. Catalano’s and Mr. Jabari’s cases can be the criminal code. For example according to penal code 192 (b) California, the penalty for involuntary manslaughter includes a maximum of up to 4 years in prison. Therefore, for the probation, the judge might be obliged to employ subjective decision making since there are no precedents to be followed while offering probation on involuntary manslaughter. As a result the judge ends up giving 10-year probation sentence. The similar case applies to Mr. Jabari where different penal codes provide that distribution of a controlled substance should be sentenced for not less than 5 years in prison (DEA, 2016). The other contention that the judge can use to support his decision is based on the grounds that the defendants committed more than one crime which demanded for consecutive and concurrent sentencing. Thus, consecutive and concurrent sentencing demands for subjective decision making since there is no specific precedent that can be followed.

Citing from Mr. Jabari’s case, it is probable that the judge used racial bias in making decisions for the two cases. According to different studies conducted to assess the issue of biased sentencing particularly for the people of color, it is factual that there is likelihood of up to 43% of being offered a prison sentence (incarceration) if the defendant is from people of color ethnicity group (PHYS, 2016). Therefore, this can be regarded as the reason why Mr. Catalano received a probation sentence and Mr. Jabari received an incarceration. The other bias that can be spotted from the two cases regards the income level of the two defendants. It is factual that Mr. Jabari was a lower income earner compared to Mr. Catalano together with the fact that he had a bigger family (with three children) than Mr. Catalano who had two children. Thus, it would have been logical for Mr. Jabari to serve a probation sentence to continue providing for his family. However, the judge appeared to overlook the consideration.

Citing from the cases that have attracted demonstration such as that of Troy Davis v. U.S criminal justice back in 2011, it is factual that demonstrations have no adverse effect upon the sentencing (Walker, 2011). This might be contended on the grounds that demonstrations only occur outside the doors of the courts whereas the ruling of the cases happens behind the doors. Thus, this means that there is no intervention that can be caused while offering a sentencing to the defendant.

Generally, it can be contended that comparing the ruling of the cases for Mr. Catalano and Mr. Jabari, there was no significant bias as the judge only appeared to employ subjective judgment with regard to the severity of the number of crimes committed. Therefore, it is noteworthy that the difference between the rulings of the two cases was resulted by application of and concurrent and consecutive sentencing type of case ruling.

References

PHYS, (2016). Study identifies racial bias in US court sentencing decisions. PHYS.org. Retrieved from phys.org/news/2016-02-racial-bias-court-sentencing-decisions.html      

Walker, S. (2011). Troy Davis v the US criminal justice system: an unfair contest. The guardian. Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/sep/22/troy-davis-criminal-justice-system

Drug enforcement administration, (2016). Subchapter 1: control and enforcement. U.S Department of Justice. Retrieved from http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/21cfr/21usc/841.htm