How does adding more minority and women judges affect theadministration of justice? Using a Tobit regression model andcontrolling for such factors as the sentence recommended by thePennsylvania sentencing guidelines showed that black judges handeddown longer incarceration sentences than white judges and that,although white judges did not tend to sentence black offenders anymore severely than they did white offenders, black judges did tendto sentence black offenders to longer prison terms than whitejudges gave to white offenders.
The state Supreme Court will hear arguments Tuesday about whether a judge has discretion to deny a prisoner compassionate release. Only two prisoners have ever been granted release under the law since it went into effect in 2021.