Report
Racial Disparity
in Houston’s Pretrial Population

There has been no shortage of discourse surrounding racial and ethnic disparities in the criminal justice system.

In fact, the need to address these inequities have emerged as a central tenet of most viable criminal justice reform efforts. However, missing from the ongoing dialogue concerning race, crime, and justice, are attempts to evolve from the mere documentation of disparity’s presence to action through empirically informed policy recommendations, program development and intervention designs. The following report represents one such localized movement toward action in Houston, Texas, the third largest criminal justice system in the nation, whereby we examine those behavioral characteristics and systematic responses that underlie the state of racial/ethnic disparities in the jail system.

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Racial Disparity

Racial Disparity

Though Harris County's current bail litigation focuses on indigency status, its influence on pretrial outcomes has significant implications for persons detained before trial. Previous examinations of disparities in pretrial release decisions simply document unequal outcomes, without identifying factors that may explain these disparities. Failing to understand the context in which inequities occur produces ineffective interventions. This report examines racial and ethnic disparity among jail bookings and the pretrial population in Harris County so that we are better able to inform and prioritize approaches to pretrial equity.

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Racial Disparity
Racial Disparity