. . .Myth 1: The criminal justice system is racist.

Fact: Individuals commit crimes, and criminals are not equally dispersed by race.

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Crime rates in the black community are significantly higher than in other subsets of American society. As Barry Latzer reports, “From 1976 to 1995, blacks were identified by police as the perpetrators in more than half of homicides. … From 2000 to 2014, African-Americans were murdered eight times as often as whites per capita, nearly always as a result of black-on-black assaults … 57% of blacks in state prison were convicted of violent crimes.”[3]. . .

Los Angeles Times reporter Jill Leovy writes, “historians have traced disproportionately high black homicide rates all the way back to the late nineteenth century, and in the early twentieth, ‘nonwhite’ homicide rates exceeded those of whites in all cities that reported federal data”:

• During the 1920s, the black homicide death rate was seven times higher than that of whites.
• During the 1940s, that rate was 12 times higher for blacks than whites.
• In the 1960s and 70s, the black homicide death rate “remained as much as ten times higher than the white rate.”
• For the last three decades, it has “been five to seven times higher.”[4]. . .

Myth 2: To stop crime, we need to stop “mass incarceration.”

Fact: To stop crime, we need to incarcerate criminals. . . .

Here’s the reality: crime rates increase when you let criminals out of prison. . . .

From 1935 to 1964, the United States enjoyed an unprecedented drop in the crime rate.[9] Then it all collapsed. From 1970 to 1990, Americans were more likely to be victimized in a violent crime than to be injured in a car accident — by a long shot.[10] As of 1990, four in ten Americans said they were afraid to walk alone at night. The crack epidemic had crippled major metropolitan areas around the country. . . .

Major metropolitan areas increased their police forces dramatically. From 1994 to 2000, under the crime policy of President Bill Clinton and mirrored on state and local levels, America added 70,000 police officers. Similarly, across the country, authorities began increasing sentencing, instituting mandatory minimums, and doing away with parole for multiple-time offenders. The crackdown on the crack epidemic meant more arrests. Prison populations soared, but crime declined dramatically. . . .

Myth 3: If you let criminals out of prison, they don’t go back to crime.

Fact: A huge majority of criminals go back to crime once released.

So, what happens when you let criminals out of prison? They go back to crime. The Bureau of Justice Statistics followed over 400,000 prisoners in 30 states after they were released from prison in 2005; here’s what they found:

• within three years, 67.8 percent were arrested again
• within five years, that number rose to 76.6 percent
• well over 80 percent of property offenders went back to crime, as did 76.9 percent of drug offenders and 71.3 percent of violent offenders.[14]

Myth 4: A huge number of people in prison are there because of drug possession.

Fact: Only a tiny portion of those in prison are there for drug possession.

Obama complained in July 2015 that the “real reason the prison population is so high” was America locking up “more and more nonviolent drug offenders than ever before, for longer than ever before.”

But as crime scholar Heather Mac Donald points out, “Prison remains a lifetime achievement award for persistence in criminal offending.”

It makes no difference that just 16 percent of state prisoners were convicted for drug offenses, and that most of those drug offenses involved distribution (just 3.6 percent of state prisoners are in for simple drug possession, and most of those people pled down their original charges from trafficking).[15]

Myth 5: More police officers endanger young minorities.

Fact: More police officers protect young minorities. . . .

The New York Post reported that by the end of the year:

• NYPD traffic tickets and summonses for minor offenses had plummeted 94 percent over the previous year
• Drug arrests dropped 84 percent
• Overall arrests dropped 66 percent . . .

As The Washington Post detailed, “The numbers of murders, rapes, assaults and robberies were all up over the first six months of 2015.” A few of the grim statistics:

• “Between January and June 2015, the number of murders was up 6.2 percent, with the biggest jumps seen in the country’s smallest and largest areas.”
• “Murders were up 17 percent in areas with fewer than 10,000 residents….”[23]
• Over the entirety of 2015, the murder rate in America’s largest cities jumped 17 percent.
• That included a 15.6 percent jump in San Francisco, an 8.5 percent jump in Los Angeles, a 25.2 percent jump in Houston, 5 percent in New York City, 83 percent jump in Nashville, 62 percent in Oklahoma City, and 54 percent in Washington D.C. [24]
• Murder jumped over 60 percent in 10 disproportionately black cities.[25]
• Overall, this represented the largest single homicide increase nationally in 25 years.[26] . . . 

Myth 6: The cops disproportionately shoot black people because of racism.

Fact: The cops are less likely to shoot black people than white people in the same circumstances.

When the police do come into contact with black people, police are less likely to kill black people than white people in the same circumstances, according to Professor Peter Moskos of John Jay College of Criminal Justice at CUNY. Moskos found that “Adjusted for the homicide rate, whites are 1.7 times more likely than blacks to die at the hands of police. Adjusted for the racial disparity at which police are feloniously killed, whites are 1.3 times more likely than blacks to die at the hands of police.”[36]. . . .

A few facts involving race and the use of deadly force:

• In 2015, the cops shot 987 people; a huge majority were armed or threatening deadly force, and blacks represented 26 percent of those shot.
• Police officers are 18.5 times more likely to be shot by a black male than an unarmed black male is to be killed by the police.[38]
• A deadly force lab study from Washington State University found that participants were biased in favor of black suspects in simulated threat scenarios.[39]
• In 2015, the DOJ analyzed the Philadelphia Police Department and found that white officers were less likely than black or Hispanic officers to shoot unarmed black suspects.[40]

Myth 7: “Stop and frisk” is racist.

Fact: “Stop and frisk” statistically undertargets minorities, prevents crime and saves minority lives.

Using New York Police Department stop-and-frisk data, blacks were 53 percent of those pulled over, despite being 23 percent of the city’s population; whites were 9 percent of those stopped, even though they were 35 percent of the population. Racism, right? Wrong. Blacks were 66 percent of violent crime suspects; blacks and Hispanics are suspects in 98 percent of all shootings in the city. Whites comprised a whopping 5 percent of violent crime suspects. That means that police statistically undertarget minorities.[43] . . . 

Myth 8: The sentencing for “crack” is higher than powder cocaine because of racism.

Fact: Sentencing disparities on cocaine are a result of rational concerns.

The disparity between crack and powder cocaine sentences came about because crack is easier to obtain and distribute, and because black legislators wanted it to rid their areas of drugs on the federal level. The sentences for crystal meth are precisely the same as those for crack. Just 16 percent of state prisoners were convicted for drug offenses, and most of those drug offenses involved distribution (just 3.6 percent of state prisoners are in for simple drug possession, and most of those people pled down their original charges from trafficking).[45]

Myth 9: Police pull over black people for “driving while black.”

Fact: Police pull over people for speeding.

The DOJ and New Jersey attorney general commissioned a study in the 1990s that clocked the speed of all drivers after finding that police pulled over blacks disproportionately. They found that black people sped disproportionately. Blacks were 25 percent of all speeders and 23 percent of drivers stopped for speeding. Naturally, the DOJ tried to kill the study.[46]

Myth 10: Unarmed black teenager Michael Brown was murdered in cold blood by a white cop while holding up his hands and saying, “Don’t shoot.”

Fact: Michael Brown strong-armed robbed a store and attacked a cop, who shot him in self-defense. . . .

It turned out that Brown wasn’t innocently walking down the street when KKK-lite Officer Wilson confronted him. He’d just strong-arm robbed a convenience store along with Johnson; the video showed the hulking Brown pushing an Asian convenience store owner bodily while sauntering out of the establishment. Wilson pulled over Brown about the time that he heard a description of the suspect over the radio. At that point, both witness and physical evidence showed, Brown punched Wilson in the face, leaned into his car through the driver’s side window, and attempted to grab Wilson’s gun. The gun went off in the car. Brown ran. Wilson stepped out of the car and told Brown to freeze. Brown turned around, then charged Wilson, at which point Wilson shot him to death. Brown was not shot in the back. No credible witness testimony had him surrendering to Wilson. And he never put his hands up to do so. . . .

Myth 11: Trayvon Martin was shot by a racist white man for the crime of being black.

Truth: Trayvon Martin was shot by a Hispanic man who was acquitted after witness testimony and physical evidence showed he likely shot Martin in self-defense. . . . 

According to the prosecution, Zimmerman provoked Martin into a fight, and then shot him. According to the defense, Martin surprised Zimmerman, asked him why he was following him, and then punched him. Witnesses then said that Martin ended up on top of Zimmerman and was pounding his head into the pavement when Zimmerman pulled out his gun and shot him. Martin’s body was not damaged except for the gunshot wound, but Zimmerman had a broken nose, two black eyes, and lacerations on his head. Zimmerman was acquitted by an all-female jury.

The Justice Department found no evidence of a race-based killing.

(Excerpt from The Daily Wire. Article by Ben Shapiro. Photo Credit: Getty Images.)

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