The author of the article is Sutton, its year of publication is 2013, and its primary goal is to come up with findings on whether the law has impacts on aggregate punishment trends and individual case outcomes. The hypotheses of the study focus on the shifts in average punitiveness, the relative influence of legal and extralegal factors on sentencing, as well as the uncertainty that accompanies the outcomes of sentencing.
The study’s sample is 83 percent of the total male defendants in the twelve counties that are included in the survey. The male defendants are selected without taking into consideration aspects such as race. Studies in each of the twelve counties selected are done in prisons and cells.
The independent variables of the study are race and ethnicity where race is measured in categories of black and white and ethnicity is measured in the categories of Hispanic and non-Hispanic. The dependent variable in the study is the prison sentence indicator, and this aspect is measured in terms of the length of prison sentences.
The study’s method of data collection focuses on the case-processing data on samples of feloney defendants in the selected twelve urban counties. The data on prison sentences in the study are sampled conveniently, thus raising no problems when it comes to analysis. Results of the study are that having a private attorney may increase the likelihood of prison sentence, defendants detained before trial are much more likely to be sentenced to prison, defendants with prior felonies were sentenced harshly in the first period while they received shorter sentences in the second period, and there are no effects of the Three Strikes on the predictability of sentence outcomes.
In the study, it is notable that there are shifts in average punitiveness, legal and extralegal factors have a relative influence on sentencing, and that there are uncertainties that accompany the outcomes of sentencing. Arguably, a limitation of the study is that the tests of the hypotheses were not given in parametric model results. Also, the simulations do not yield evidence that sentencing became more or less predictable due to the Three Strikes.