The Over-criminalization and Inequitable Policing and Sentencing of Latin@s within the Judicial System of the United States: The Latin@ Addition to the School-to-Prison Pipeline

ABSTRACT

This theoretical paper focuses on the creation of the overly criminalistic Latin@ stereotype in the United States as a response to growing numbers of immigrants threatening white hegemony. As a mechanism of social control, Latin@s have faced inequitable treatment within the judicial and school systems of the United States. This paper examines criminality literature and its focus on the white/black binary before a legal system evolution that controls Latin@s. Social, legal, and racial control of Latin@s has occurred via negative public sentiment, inequitable juror practices, biased judicial sentencing and leniency, over-policing, and the “War on Drugs.”

KEYWORDS:

• Legal issues
• Latino/a children and families
• migration/transnationalism
• race/racialization
• teacher preparation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

¹ As the term “Hispanic” has European roots and does not allow, as Wallerstein (2005) noted, to allow Lati@s to demand “rights they are denied and opportunities they do not have” (p. 35). For the purpose of this article, “Hispanic” will only be used if quoted within the original source text.