Citizens for Racial Equity in Washtenaw (CREW) was formed to gather public data on the charging and sentencing of individuals in Washtenaw County and to assess whether the data reflected any racial disparities and the impact of any disparity on members of our community. Though we have begun to have extensive discussions on problems with discriminatory policing practices in our county, we have had very little data or focus so far on discriminatory practices in our court system. We hope our report will be the beginning of such a conversation.
The report has just been released. The data shows clear patterns of the kinds of racial disparities that we find in our criminal justice system throughout our country. Our report is not an easy or quick read though there is an executive summary at the beginning with our key conclusions and recommendations. My hope is that those of you who want to overcome these forms of discimination in Washtenaw county will take the time to read through it so that we can come together as a community to determine how to transform our local justice system so that it might be more equitable and restorative in its practices.
View the report here: https://www.citizensforracialequitywashtenaw.org/