By Caitlin Farmer 

Georgia’s correctional system currently encompasses 49,747 people. They are dispersed among the state’s 34 State Prisons, four private prisons, 183 jails, 19 Regional Youth Detention Centers, six Youth Development Centers, but thousands more are under correctional control by probation and parole.

Placement within the criminal justice system is mainly determined by the level of offense individuals are charged with, although it depends on factors such as age, economic status, gender and criminal history. 

In 2021, 13,611 new people were placed into Georgia correctional facilities and over 60% of them were sent to a state prison, according to the Georgia Department of Corrections 2021 Inmate Statistical Profile. 

Of the 13,611 new inmates, the report found that the largest racial group admitted was white, making up 48.73% of the population. The second largest group admitted were Black, making up 48.13% of the population with 6,551 inmates and the third largest were Hispanic, 2.62% of inmates or 356 people.

Although the difference between the largest racial groups of newly admitted inmates is less than 100 people, when intersected with gender, larger gaps appear. 

When comparing how many inmates were admitted in 2021 by race and gender, the report said that Black men were the most admitted group, making up 6,195 of the 12,226 men at 50.67%. The second largest racial group of men admitted were white, 45.98% of the male population. 

White women were admitted to the correctional system significantly more than Black women, making up 72.92% of the women admitted in 2021 with 1,010 white female inmates. Black women made up 25.70% of the population, with 356 female inmates. 

Despite the difference in Black and white people arrested in 2021 being a small gap of less than 1,000 people, this isn’t representative of the full scope of racial differences within the corrections and criminal justice systems in Georgia.   

Cause and effect 

According to The Sentencing Project, an organization centered around research and advocacy for reform, in 2019 there were 2.8 Black people incarcerated per every white person in Georgia. Although this is almost triple the rate of white people, they concluded that Georgia is ranked 46 out of the 50 states for the highest racial disparity in incarceration rates. 

In 2018, the Sentencing Project reported to the United Nations on racial disparities in the U.S. criminal justice system. The report said that at the end of 2015, almost 7 million people were under a form of correctional control in the U.S., making it the country with the highest incarceration rate and masking the racial disparities within the system. 

“African Americans are more likely than white Americans to be arrested; once arrested, they are more likely to be convicted; and once convicted, and they are more likely to experience lengthy prison sentences,” the report said. “African-American adults are 5.9 times as likely to be incarcerated than whites and Hispanics are 3.1 times as likely. As of 2001, one of every three black boys born in that year could expect to go to prison in his lifetime, as could one of every six Latinos—compared to one of every seventeen white boys.” 

The source of the racial disparities are not solely due to racial discrimination, the report said, but rather are a part of a deeper and more systemic issue: Economic status. 

“The United States in effect operates two distinct criminal justice systems: one for wealthy people and another for poor people and people of color,” the Sentencing Project said. “In 2016, black Americans comprised 27% of all individuals arrested in the United States—double their share of the total population. Black youth accounted for 15% of all U.S. children yet made up 35% of juvenile arrests in that year. What might appear at first to be a linkage between race and crime is in large part a function of concentrated urban poverty, which is far more common for African Americans than for other racial groups.” 

Assistance in Athens 

Denise Sunta, program manager and administrative assistant at Athens Anti Discrimination Movement, said that through her role with AADM, she often is contacted to help reduce these disparities. Sunta said that one of the main goals of AADM, founded in 2016 by Mokah-Jasmine Johnson and her husband Knowa Johnson, is to reach a compromise for both parties involved when someone feels they have been discriminated against by an organization, business or the government. 

Sunta said she typically is the person on the receiving end of AADM’s calls for assistance, which consist heavily of people inquiring for help raising funds to post someone’s bail. 

“Overwhelmingly, the people that end up calling us or the person that they’re calling about, is black and brown,” Sunta said. “So that signals to me again, that those are the people who cannot make whatever bond it is.”

Sunta said this is just one area where there are noticeable disparities between the intersection of race and outcomes in the criminal justice system. 

“You get a bond at the very beginning, you know, when you’re first arrested, but there are a lot of opportunities after that for a public defender or a lawyer to end up reducing that bond. I’ve also seen some disparities there as well which again, could be brought back to folks’ legal representation as well, like access to legal representation,” Sunta said. 

Echoing the sentiments in The Sentencing Project’s report to the UN, Sunta said that a majority of lower-income individuals tend to be Black and when people of lower-income find themselves facing legal issues, they are left to rely on public defenders as their representation.  

“Public defenders have a client list that is like hundreds of people long, so they don’t always have the same ability to pay attention to every single need that their client has, might not be able to file as many motions, whether that’s for bond reduction, or dropping charges,” Sunta said. 

In terms of arrest rates per racial group, Sunta said the disparity exists there too, especially among youth. 

“Bad behavior is not treated the same way or seen the same way for black kids as it is for white kids, or white passing children,” Sunta said. “So you typically do end up seeing kids who end up being involved in the criminal justice system or having to, to, to go through that process being Black and Brown versus you know, just getting suspension or having to go through some kind of class.”

In her experience, Sunta said that most of the people AADM works with are facing charges or have been sentenced for crimes of criminal trespassing due to homelessness and possession of Methamphetamine, oftentimes without the added charge of having intent to distribute it. 

For youth, Sunta said she has seen most of them facing charges or have been sentenced for theft crimes such as shoplifting, or simple battery stemming from fighting. 

“I think that a lot of times people will settle for charges that they probably could have challenged, which definitely does impact their sentencing, you know, whether they end up having to serve time or if they’re just sentenced to probation,” Sunta said. “I will say, I have seen some disparities there in terms of like the difference between being sentenced probation for like misdemeanor charges or something like that, versus like, getting jail time as well.” Sunta said 

Although it does depend on the charges, Sunta said, there is no question that race plays a part in people’s access, a determining factor in sentencing outcomes. 

“I’ve seen people in very similar situations have very different outcomes and the difference is that legal representation,” Sunta said.

Legal representation is just one piece of a complicated puzzle that many are faced with daily. The criminal justice system’s branches and facilities are wide-ranging. 

“The U.S. doesn’t have one “criminal justice system;” instead, we have thousands of federal, state, local, and tribal systems. Together, these systems hold almost 2 million people in 1,566 state prisons, 102 federal prisons, 2,850 local jails, 1,510 juvenile correctional facilities, 186 immigration detention facilities, and 82 Indian country jails, as well as in military prisons, civil commitment centers, state psychiatric hospitals, and prisons in the U.S. territories,” said Wendy Sawyer and Peter Wagner at the Prison Policy Initiative in a May 2022 report on mass incarceration.