Civil Rights Convictions for July 2012
The latest available data from the Justice Department show that during July 2012 the government reported 10 new civil rights convictions. According to the case-by-case information analyzed by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), this number is up from 5 the previous month.
The comparisons of the number of defendants convicted for civil rights-related offenses are based on case-by-case information obtained by TRAC under the Freedom of Information Act from the Executive Office for United States Attorneys. (See Table 2)
When monthly 2012 convictions of this type are compared with those of the same period in the previous year, the number of convictions was down (-2.9 percent). Convictions over the past year are still much higher than they were five years ago. Overall, the data show that convictions of this type are up 15.8 percent from levels reported in 2007.
The growth in these cases is partly related to increases in the matters filed in U.S. Magistrate Courts. If magistrate cases are excluded and only Federal District Court cases are counted, the overall increase in civil rights convictions is 10.5 percent instead of 15.8 percent. The evidence suggests that part of the difference may be the result of improvements in the recording of the magistrate cases by the Justice Department.
The increase from the levels five years ago in civil rights convictions for these matters is shown more clearly in Figure 2. The vertical bars in Figure 2 represent the number of civil rights convictions of this type recorded on a month-to-month basis. Where a prosecution was initially filed in U.S. Magistrate Court and then transferred to the U.S. District Court, the magistrate filing date was used since this provides an earlier indicator of actual trends. The superimposed line on the bars plots the six-month moving average so that natural fluctuations are smoothed out. To view trends year-by-year rather than month-by-month, see TRAC's annual report series for a broader picture.
Number of Defendants in Civil Rights Cases
Table 2 lists all separate cases with the number of defendants.
Case Defendant # 2012 - Ohio, N (Cleveland) Case: 1 1 Details 2012 - Ohio, N (Cleveland) Case: 1 2 Details 2012 - Ohio, N (Cleveland) Case: 1 3 Details 2012 - Cal, S (San Diego) Case: 2 1 Details 2012 - Ga, M (Macon) Case: 3 1 Details 2012 - Mo, W (Kansas City) Case: 4 1 Details 2012 - Montana (Billings) Case: 5 1 Details 2012 - Texas, S (Houston) Case: 6 1 Details 2012 - Wisc, E (Milwaukee) Case: 7 1 Details 2012 - Wisc, E (Milwaukee) Case: 8 1 Details Table 2: Number of defendants per case
Report Generated: October 1, 2012
