By Steve Thorpe
Legal News
Great progress has been made in introducing diversity into our local legal system, but we still have a long way to go. That was the conclusion of a panel of prosecutors, defense attorneys and academics, moderated by a judge, at Wayne State Law School.
The school recently presented a panel discussion about cultural diversity in prosecution and its importance to the American criminal justice system.
Panelists included Barbara L. McQuade, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan, Wayne Law Professor Peter Henning, Wayne County Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Lisa Lindsey, attorney James L. Feinberg of James L. Feinberg & Associates, Wayne County Criminal Defense Bar President Susan Reed and Assistant U.S. Attorney Abed Hammoud. Judge Patricia Fresard of Wayne County Circuit Court was the moderator.
Reed said that many defendants believe they can’t receive a fair trial if the courtroom doesn’t reflect their community.
“We believe a diverse prosecutor’s office is the fairest way our clients can receive justice,” she said. “When a defendant comes into court and sees a prosecutor of judge who looks nothing like them, they lose all faith in the system.”
Lindsey pointed out that some of the biases can be subtle — even unconscious — but have serious consequences for defendants.
“When I first started in the prosecutors office, I found there was a disparity in the way white defendants and black defendants were treated,” she said. “We have a great deal of discretion as prosecutors as to whether someone is charged with a felony or misdemeanor. I found that, if the defendant was white, often the prosecutor would charge them with a misdemeanor rather than a felony. I once asked, leaving race out of it, ‘Why didn’t you charge this defendant with a felony?’ And the prosecutor replied, ‘He comes from a good family.’ To me, that addressed a whole range of subtle issues of not only racism, but classism and poverty issues. You can saddle somebody with a felony if they come from a poor family.”
Hammoud emphasized that attention to diversity helps government agencies like his and defense law firms get better.
“Diversity is not just the right thing to do, it makes business sense,” he said. “Don’t hire someone to make yourself feel good, do it to help your organization.”
His boss, Barbara McQuade, has made diversity a priority since she took over as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan.
“I have tried very hard as the person responsible for hiring to improve the diversity of our ranks (in the U.S. Attorney’s Office),” she said. “We’ve hired people born in Lebanon, Liberia and Congo. We’ve hired African Americans, females, Hispanics and Asians. We’re not just waiting for people to come to us, we’re encouraging people to apply.”
Lindsey pointed out that diversity can go beyond what people look like to other cultural factors like their speech.
“When I get excited, I sometimes forget to conjugate my verbs,” she said. “I don’t always speak the King’s English and may lapse into what is colloquially referred to as ‘Ebonics.’ But, so do my witnesses. So does the defendant. It gives me a way to connect to people on a more human level.”
And Lindsey said she occasionally gets pressure from her community over her role as a prosecutor.
“People have said to me, ‘How can you put your black brothers in jail?’ “
On a lighter note, McQuade recalled an incident from earlier in her career that demonstrated some of the barriers women faced as they entered the role of prosecutor.
“I was prosecuting a child pornography case when I was nine months pregnant,” she said. “I’m very short, so I was about as wide as I am tall. Before the trial, the defense attorney filed a motion of prosecutorial misconduct against me that it would taint the jury against his client to see a pregnant prosecutor, creating undue sympathy for children. The judge said it was nonsense and denied the motion.”
The program was sponsored by the Hispanic Bar Association and Wayne Law’s Career Services Office.
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