A year-long investigative reporting project by the Herald-Tribune in Sarasota culminated in "Bias on the Bench," a series of articles revealing what reporters describe as a sentencing system in Florida that all too often falls victim to a judge's personal prejudices on race, politics, and gender.
The four-part series found the state incarcerates black convicts for longer stretches of time, subjects them to harsher punishments, and offers them fewer opportunities to avoid jail or felonies than their white counterparts convicted of the same crime.
Wednesday at 1 p.m. on Gulf Coast Live, Herald-Tribune investigative reporters Elizabeth Johnson and Emily Le Coz detail their reporting about Florida's sentencing system, and how they built a database to sift through thousands of court records going back more than a decade. They'll also discuss how that data led to their conclusion of a biased sentencing system.
Also joining the program is Judge Lee Haworth, the former Chief Judge of Florida's Twelfth Judicial Circuit (covering Sarasota, DeSoto, and Manatee County), who now acts as a senior judge for the Twelfth Circuit's Pro Bono Committee.