Death in Dallas: Sentencing patterns of pre-Furman capital offenders

Abstract

Whether racial bias is intertwined with capital case dispositions continue to be a matter of contention. In 1972, Furman v. Georgia ruled capital punishment unconstitutional on the grounds of being capricious and arbitrary. To better understand this sociological phenomenon, the current paper examines capital punishment within a historical context. Specifically, the present study is an exploratory examination of county-level data consisting of offenders who received a death sentence between 1923 through 1972. Media accounts from a Dallas newspaper during that time period were also examined. Results indicate that Blacks were disproportionately sentenced to death compared to their White counterparts. Capital sentencing trends at the county level reflect national trends of racial bias that characterized this historical period.

Keywords:

• Capital punishment
• pre-Furman era
• media
• death penalty
• capital sentencing
• racial bias

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sarah A. El Sayed

Sarah A. El Sayed is an assistant professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Texas at Arlington. Her research interests include developmental and life course criminology, gender and criminal outcomes, as well as quantitative methods. Recent articles have been published in outlets such as Criminal Justice and Behavior, Crime and Delinquency, Deviant Behavior, and Journal of Quantitative Criminology.

Denise Paquette Boots

Denise Paquette Boots is the Associate Dean of Undergraduate Education in the School of Economic, Political & Policy Sciences, a Professor of Public Policy and Political Economy, and the Senior Research Fellow in the Institute for Urban Policy Research at the University of Texas at Dallas. She is a former U.S. Border Patrol Agent trainee and a Level 4 juvenile counselor for adjudicated youth. Her research agenda focuses on issues related to interpersonal violence, with an emphasis on domestic violence and homicide, child abuse and neglect, campus sexual assault, mental health, problem-solving courts, neuropsychological vulnerabilities, capital punishment, gendered pathways to crime and victimization, parricide, and outcome and process evaluations of courts and criminal justice programs.

James W. Marquart

James W. Marquart is the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs at Lamar University. One of the nation's leading experts on prison systems, Dr. Marquart's extensive academic record includes more than $2 million in funded research activity, 50 presentations, more than 60 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, and 7 books. Research and teaching interests include prison organizations, capital punishment, and criminal justice policy.

Stephanie M. Sanford

Stephanie M. Sanford is a Ph.D. criminology student at the University of Texas at Dallas. Her research interests include qualitative methods, violent crimes, biosocial criminology, as well as developmental/lifecourse criminology. She holds a B.A. degree in psychology from the University of Texas at Austin and a M.A. degree from the University of Texas at Arlington. Currently, she is working on a paper that examines General Strain Theory and gender differences in stress among police officers.