ertain time could mean drug peddling, but the fact that they are targeting youths with no evidence to arrest is discrimination. The Home office in 1991 studied prison statistics in Britain’s prisons. It was found that even though 5.8% of the total population was from an ethnic origin, 18.2% of the prison population seemed to be from the same category. Maybe people with ethnic origins have the need to commit more crime than the rest of the population, but it could be just discrimination. As Michael Banton said, ‘Ethnic groups are distinguished by the ways in which their culture differs from that of other groups, and they will therefore have their characteristic forms of deviance’. Statistically, there is a big impact on the figures when there is a distinct pattern emerging from the subcultures of certain ethnic groups if the crimes are repeated frequently. It was found that the majority of the prisoners with ethnic origins were actual foreign nationals. Unjustified suspicion is effected when blacks are stopped for questioning. Studies have found that more and more black people are stopped on the streets for questioning, but few are charged as a result. This shows that the police have tainted images of black people. Walker (1989) studied three different ethnic groups (white, black and Asian suspects) in two age categories (17-20yrs and 21-25yrs) and found that more blacks than whites were refused bail by both the police and the courts. This has led to the over-representation of blacks in prison. That is why the prison figures are 18.2% more than the total population. Walker found that discrimination was found in one age category but not another. The high representation of certain ethnic minority groups in prison are due to the arrests of foreign ‘mules’ bringing drugs into Britain (Green, 1991). The prison statistics show that by the end of the criminal justice system process, black people we...
