RT Article
T1 Sentencing disparities in the Czech Republic: Empirical evidence from post-communist Europe
JF European journal of criminology
VO 17
IS 2
SP 151
OP 174
A1 Drápal, Jakub 1990-
LA English
YR 2020
UL https://krimdok.uni-tuebingen.de/Record/1690223804
AB Although there is an extensive literature on sentencing disparities in common law countries, there have been only a few empirical studies in continental countries and virtually none in post-communist ones. This article presents findings from the Czech Republic, which show that there are important disparities in post-communist Europe, comparable to those in the USA before the introduction of sentencing guidelines. I employ a multi-level modelling approach to study the sentencing practices in Czech district courts for the three most common offences. The values of intra-cluster correlation are found to be between .066 and .178 for the various models, which is considered high. The specifics of civil law post-communist countries are further discussed in relation to choosing appropriate ways of reducing disparities.
K1 Czech Republic
K1 Post-communist countries
K1 Sentencing disparities
DO 10.1177/1477370818773612