Modeling Matters: Comparing the Presumptive Sentence Versus Base Offense Level Approaches for Estimating Racial/Ethnic Effects on Federal Sentencing

ConclusionsFindings suggest that the presumptive sentence approach filters out important racial/ethnic differences in the pre-sentence process and that the two modeling approaches are not interchangeable. Results clearly indicate that modeling matters in sentencing research, and future research should pay close attention to their baselines for between-group differences in relevant conduct.
Source: Journal of Quantitative Criminology - Category: Criminology Source Type: research