Is There Racial Bias in Capital Punishment? | Experts Debate the Death Penalty

Research on capital sentencing has been conducted for over 40 years, and one finding recurs across studies: the race of the victim correlates with who receives a death sentence. What that finding means, and whether it survives scrutiny, is among the most contested questions in the death penalty debate.

For some people, the data shows a system that values some lives more than others, tracking a longer American history of unequal justice. Others argue the studies collapse when legitimate case differences are taken into account, and that the same data has failed when tested in court.

In this segment from our debate, Should the Death Penalty Be Abolished?, all four debaters take on the question directly: Diann Rust-Tierney on four decades of consistent findings, Kent Scheidegger on why he believes the effects vanish under reanalysis, Barry Scheck on the study that reached the Supreme Court, and Robert Blecker on where he believes a real race effect actually lives.

Watch the full debate from 2015

Arguing YES:

Diann Rust-Tierney, Former Executive Director of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty

Barry Scheck, Co-Director of the Innocence Project and Professor at Cardozo Law School

Arguing NO:

Robert Blecker, Professor at New York Law School

Kent Scheidegger, Legal Director of the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation

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