John Pfaff was quoted in an Alternet article about racial disparities in the U.S. criminal justice system.
“It’s definitely optimistic news,” Fordham University law professor and imprisonment trends expert John Pfaff told the Marshall Project. “But the racial disparity remains so vast that it’s pretty hard to celebrate. How, exactly, do you talk about ‘less horrific?'”
It behooves analysts and policy-makers alike to try to make sense of the changing complexion of the prison population, but that’s no easy task.
“Our inability to explain it suggests how poorly we understand the mechanics behind incarceration in general,” Pfaff said.