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Legal issue
Whether and how racial and ethnic disparities in juvenile-justice processing bear on equal-protection claims. The developmental and criminological record shows youth of colour overrepresented at every decision point — detention, formal processing, secure confinement, and waiver — with disparities that persist after offence and prior record are controlled. How much of the residual reflects differential system treatment rather than unmeasured differences in involvement remains genuinely contested, and the claims under this issue are graded to reflect that contest rather than to resolve it. Doctrinally, the gap between that record and a winning claim is the point. Equal protection requires proof of discriminatory purpose, not merely disparate outcome (Washington v. Davis; McCleskey v. Kemp), and Mitchell v. People, 2026 CO 8, applies that rule squarely to a juvenile prosecuted as an adult: statistics showing disproportionate treatment of Black youth nationally, statewide, and in the charging district did not establish either discriminatory effect or discriminatory purpose, because the defendant could not show he was similarly situated to the non-Black codefendants who were treated more leniently. The practical consequence for counsel is specific: this science establishes the pattern and frames the question, but it does not by itself carry an equal-protection burden. It does its work paired with individualized comparator evidence, or in the forums where disparate impact alone is actionable — legislative reform, consent decrees, and disposition advocacy — rather than as standalone proof of intent.
Verified passages where courts have addressed this issue. The citator badge reflects each case's overallsubsequent treatment by later courts — not doubt about the quoted passage — and any “N citing” figure is that case's global citation count, not specific to this issue.
Sets the governing two-element test for a race-based selective-prosecution claim by a juvenile (discriminatory effect + discriminatory purpose) and explains why population-level disparity statistics, standing alone, satisfy neither. The controlling authority for what this issue's science can be used to prove.