Race and Wrongful Conviction in the United States

This class examines the racial origins of wrongful conviction in the U.S. criminal justice system. We examine how wrongful conviction is created through both formal laws as well as social norms of practice that obscure how racial bias infiltrates seemingly race-neutral areas of due process. While legal scholars and lawyers examine wrongful conviction as a type of “misfire” in an otherwise functioning criminal justice system, this course considers how wrongful conviction is type of social system within the mainstay of the criminal justice system, at large. In the tradition of W.E.B. Du Bois, we examine how racism is the engine of this social system that is best referred to as “mass wrongful conviction.” Pre-requisite: SOC 1020 or an equivalent social science methods course.