The Bad Math Used To Punish Criminals

Documentaries, television and movies are obsessed with crime. Is the accused actually guilty? If not, who is? If so, will they get away with it? All these questions matter -- but the most important question might be what happens when a criminal is sentenced.

Determining a fair and just sentence for an offender is a delicate balance of punishment, rehabilitation and protection. From Aristotle to restorative justice initiatives, we’ve spent thousands of years developing theories of sentencing and striving for better ways to implement them. But no matter how refined our concept of justice becomes, it’s also subject to overt biases and both conscious and unconscious discrimination based on any number of factors, from age and race to completely unrelated societal forces. Does that mean real justice is impossible? And can we combat the failings of the human mind by replacing people with mandated algorithms?

The answer is yes -- and no. When Marvin Frankel conceived of a justice system that would remove bias and variations in sentencing from United States federal sentencing, he was convinced that he’d ushered in a new, fairer regime of sentencing. In a way, he had… when Congress passed the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984, criminal sentencing became significantly more consistent. But it also opened the door to even more sinister discrimination with mandatory minimums and disparate impacts on minorities -- precisely some of the problems the sentencing reform was meant to address. It also rendered useless the professional experience of judges and ran complex crimes, and their victims, through a dispassionate algorithm that failed to tailor results to specific circumstances.

Justice is hard, and we continue to figure out how to do it right. Maybe it can be based on numbers. Maybe it should be based on feelings. And maybe it’s just impossible to achieve perfect justice.

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Hosted and Produced by Kevin Lieber

Research and Writing by Matthew Tabor

Editing by John Swan

Huge Thanks To Paula Lieber

#education #vsauce #crime

[jima]

"The hungry judge effect is a finding that judges were more inclined to be lenient after a meal but more severe before the break."

[WolfyTheDark]

I like how this entire series comes down to "Most things cannot be solved with math, " and "Most things are not black and white, " substantiated by math and black text on white paper.

[visekual]

I think a partial solution would be to have each case evaluated by more than just one person, and perhaps even apply the expression that justice is blind more literally, if the judge cannot see the person on trial, this removes biased choices based on appearance or behavior.

[eggycrunchybob]

I always liked the saying "We have a legal system where legal stuff happens, not a justice system."

[esepecesito]

You should talk about how important it is that the law have to be easy to understand for EVERYBODY, which is way too often not the case. Trying to understand the law without a lawyer could put you in deep trouble... but should NOT be like that...

[I_am_Irisarc]

I like this new serious Kevin. The topics he's talked about have been both fascinating and thought-provoking.

Keep up the good work, Kevin!

[sweetcornwhiskey]

"We've just incentivized everyone to go steal Elon Musk's car because your punishment would only be the 2 minutes of labor it took him to buy it." Idk Kevin, that sounds pretty fair to me

[sohopedeco]

I'm shocked about how much leeway judges get in American law. Even with the mandatory algorythm, the maximum minimum sentence is SIX YEARS!

In Brazil, we have an algorythm called the "triphasic method", which is pretty complicated, but forces judges to explain every single relevant aspect of the crime according to the law.

[rahulsaravanan]

Court: Delivers harsher punishments after some team loses
The Team That lost the match a day before: --_--

[chrispi]

What I love about this story is that humans biased the system to the point they felt needed to invent an algorithm that was more fair (even with some glitches), but where so bad at using it that they start to add biases to their own judgement on how to fill the algorithm and therefore, conclude that the problem was the algorithm...

It's quite close to "The Algorithm" of Youtube, a lot of folks says that it is bad and biased without realizing that this is just mimicking a human behavior based on humain behavior. We are just good at blaming the result of our own failures and put it on someone or something else.

We're not really good at taking responsibilities overall, maybe this is the problem... not us.

[NickCombs]

The math for stealing Musk's car is pretty funny, but honestly doesn't seem that unfair. From Musk's perspective, he's probably losing more than two minutes to replace the stolen car. But that can be factored in. At that point if you were in need, it would probably be easier to tell the person beforehand that you need their item and come up with an arrangement rather than treating it as a crime and going through the courts.

[MrSoggycat]

My law school professor told my class - in sentencing, judges use their "feelings".

[Krunschy]

I'm shocked how the main goal of the system was punishment. Sure it grants victims some sense of revenge, but amongst the all possible motivations at 1:48 it's the only one not actively aimed at actually making matters better.

[Lolo]

Those questions at the end were very good.

As I was younger, during my teenage years, I always thought that we should value punishment over rehabilitation.

As I grew older that changed. I now think there has to be a balance. Punishment So the victim has some sort of redemption or satisfaction, but it is also about rehabilitation. Criminals lives also have value and they have families and should have the chance to have a free future together with their loved ones.

I know there are criminals which seriously are a threat to the whole society without any chance of rehabilitation due to there psyche. It is hard to distinguish and i am all for it to put those away forever... but i always fear, if i had to choose, would i set someone bad free or sentence someone with chance for rehabilitation for live in prison?...

Glad i dont have to make such choices.

[GothBear]

i mean the musk theft seems fair to me.

[WhiskeyNixon]

I got eight years for possession of Marijuana in South Dakota, 2006. Many of the years since have been spent pondering exactly the questions you raise here. Thanks.

[WilliamBrowning]

The questions on my mind are along the lines of, 'have we tried all rehabilitation strategies' and 'have we really tried any rehabilitation strategies'.

[danielenglish]

Instead of dropping mandatory guidelines they should work on improving them. Put increasingly more factors into it.
For example, it had:
1) In possession of a firearm +2
2) Discharging firearm +1
You could change #2 to include:
Discharging firearm +1
a) towards a person or persons +1
i) towards upper body +1
ii) towards legs +0
b) away from persons +0

And so on.
Any injustice in sentencing should be addressed by editing the sentencing guidelines, grandfather it back. People can then apply for a change in sentence based on guidelines changing.

Also, instead of:
Doing +4

It could be:
Doing +1
a) with ill intent +3
b) with gross indifference +2
c) with indifference+1
d) with good intent +0
e) with just intent -1

Over time, turn the guidelines into a behemoth of every conceivable consideration.

[brandonpohl]

4:50 gotta be honest, this sounds like a perfect solution to me

[smileyp]

This is so incredibly simple, the issue is that you're trying to PUNISH people not fix the conditions that cause crime, rehabilitative justice over punitive 'justice'.

It's just impossible to "properly punish" someone so we shouldn't even try, the goal is to fix the problem not put people in a dangerous brick walled and iron barred "time out" that's just rediculous