Sociologist: Death sentence more likely if victim is high-status

A University of Denver sociology professor who studied 504 capital cases concludes that defendants convicted of killing "high-status" victims are more likely to be sentenced to death.

According to new research by Scott Phillips, associate professor of sociology and criminology at the University of Denver, the probability of being sentenced to death is much greater for defendants who kill married, college-educated white or Hispanic victims with no criminal records, as opposed to unmarried black or Asian victims with criminal records but no college degrees. Scholarly discussions about the death penalty often focus on cost or innocence, but Philips' study, based on 504 death penalty cases that occurred in Harris County, Texas between 1992 and 1999, centers on arbitrariness. His findings and conclusions are published in Law and Society Review (43-4:807-837). Previous research by Phillips used the same data to demonstrate that black defendants were more likely to be sentenced to death than white defendants in Houston, even though they were less likely to kill "high-status" victims. Phillips suggests that the combined results of his studies call into question the meaning of justice and strike at the heart of the death penalty debate. He asks,

"Should justice be defined according to the punishment a particular defendant deserves? Or should justice be defined according to whether the judicial system can hand out lethal punishment in an even-handed manner?"