In a bid to eliminate unconscious bias against criminal suspects, San Joaquin County’s district attorney aims to have a policy fully in place by Friday that excludes race from any charging decisions.
District Attorney Ron Freitas says his office will be one of the state’s early adopters of “race-blind charging” as mandated by the Legislature. It requires that prosecutors go to extra lengths to exclude race when making a decision about whether to file criminal charges against suspects.
“I am proud we’re not just complying with the law; we’re setting the standard for justice in California,” Freitas said in a statement. “By early adopting race-blind charging, we’re ensuring our justice system operates without racial bias. I’m proud that San Joaquin County is leading the way, demonstrating our commitment to true equality.”
Race-blind charging works by redacting racial identifiers — such as the race of a potential defendant as well as their name and address — from crime reports and other documents that will be reviewed by prosecutors in order to make a decision about whether to file a criminal charge.
The rule takes effect in 2025.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office issued guidelines to county prosecutors in January about the policy.
“Unconscious bias has no place in the criminal justice system and should not play a role in charging,” Bonta said in a statement at the time.
Bonta’s office established a two-step process for charging — one with redacted documents followed by one based on original transcripts.
The first, designed to be racially blind, takes a look at an initial case to see whether it merits charges, although the actual charges are not determined at that time. It is to be performed by personnel not associated with the filing of charges or through automation, such as an artificial-intelligence program, to achieve racial blindness.
The second, more rigorous examination looks at the unredacted documents and involves deciding which charges to file.
Yolo County’s D.A. pioneered race-blind charging in 2021 using a computer program designed to eliminate racial references in documents reviewed by prosecutors.
The Computational Policy Lab, based around a team of researchers at Harvard, Stanford and New York University, is employing artificial intelligence to scan documents used by prosecutors in charging decisions. It is designed to automatically redact references to race, physical descriptions, names, addresses, neighborhoods or other references that could lead to stereotyping or assumptions about race and replaces them with generic references.
Bonta’s guidelines say such programs are fine to use as long as “appropriate safeguards are in place to prevent unauthorized access to sensitive information.”
This original story was written by Chris Woodyard for Stocktonia.