The time of day inmates appear for a parole hearing in Kookfornia is irrelevant because computers determine who will be released by predicting future behavior and then classifying those to be paroled as low-risk, non-violent offenders. As a result, these low-risk, non-violent parolees are arrested daily for murders, rapes and robberies. Perhaps those computers could use an infusion of glucose.
GLUCOSE LEVELS AFFECT PAROLE BOARD DECISIONS
Grits for Breakfast
August 20, 2011
The New York Times this week had a story on decisionmaking that included a fascinating reference to a study of release decisions by the Israeli parole board, one that's almost certainly applicable here in Texas given the much vaster volume of cases considered:
__There was a pattern to the parole board’s decisions, but it wasn’t related to the men’s ethnic backgrounds, crimes or sentences. It was all about timing, as researchers discovered by analyzing more than 1,100 decisions over the course of a year. Judges, who would hear the prisoners’ appeals and then get advice from the other members of the board, approved parole in about a third of the cases, but the probability of being paroled fluctuated wildly throughout the day. Prisoners who appeared early in the morning received parole about 70 percent of the time, while those who appeared late in the day were paroled less than 10 percent of the time. ...
__The benefits of glucose were unmistakable in the study of the Israeli parole board. In midmorning, usually a little before 10:30, the parole board would take a break, and the judges would be served a sandwich and a piece of fruit. The prisoners who appeared just before the break had only about a 20 percent chance of getting parole, but the ones appearing right after had around a 65 percent chance. The odds dropped again as the morning wore on, and prisoners really didn’t want to appear just before lunch: the chance of getting parole at that time was only 10 percent. After lunch it soared up to 60 percent, but only briefly. Remember that Jewish Israeli prisoner who appeared at 3:10 p.m. and was denied parole from his sentence for assault? He had the misfortune of being the sixth case heard after lunch. But another Jewish Israeli prisoner serving the same sentence for the same crime was lucky enough to appear at 1:27 p.m., the first case after lunch, and he was rewarded with parole. It must have seemed to him like a fine example of the justice system at work, but it probably had more to do with the judge’s glucose levels.
There's plenty of debate over what criteria parole boards should use to make release decisions, but this study reminds us that rationality may not always be the main (or at least the only) driving factor behind who gets released, and when.
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