Since college tuition costs have soared over the past decade, and wages and purchasing power have stagnated, there is vociferous debate in the media about the value of a college diploma. Millions of Americans carry heavy student debt burdens that will take them decades to repay; some owe more than they originally borrowed and have little hope of paying it off in a lifetime, unless they get loan forgiveness or an unexpected windfall. Meanwhile, university graduates get better paying jobs than people who did not go to college, accounting for a difference of millions of dollars in lifetime earnings.  

Graduates will also tell you that college education is not just about money; they will tell you that they use their advanced thinking and writing skills outside the workplace, too. By this logic, does this mean that a college degree enables you to talk your way out of criminal penalties? A new report on disparities in sentencing does not go that far, but it does show education-based differences in sentencing. Even if you did not go to college, or if you dropped out, leaving you with piles of student loan debt and no diploma, contact a Tulsa criminal defense lawyer.

Is Your College Diploma a “Get Out of Jail Free” Card?

The next time your parents give you a hard time about your impractical college major and your cannabis habit, show them the new report from the Harvard Gazette. It shows that college graduates have a clear advantage in criminal court, at least in the kinds of cases it studied. The report was based on data about the sentences for people convicted of nonviolent drug felonies; it included defendants who pleaded guilty and those whose conviction arose from a guilty verdict at trial. Keep in mind that most criminal cases that do not disappear as quickly as they started end in convictions, because more than 90% of defendants plead guilty. When convicted on the same charges, the college-educated defendants were less than half as likely to get prison time as the ones who did not go to college.

The study also found racial disparities in sentencing, with Black defendants 1.5 times as likely as White defendants to get prison time for equivalent charges; these were the data from 2023. The racial disparities in sentencing have become less over time. They reached a peak in 1992, at the height of the War on Drugs. In the early 1990s, Black defendants convicted of felony drug charges were 14 times as likely as White defendants to go to prison for the same offense. The report did not include data for any other racial groups.

Contact Tracy Tiernan About Criminal Defense Cases

Regardless of your education level or any other demographic factors, you have the right to representation by a lawyer in criminal court. A criminal defense lawyer can help you if you are facing criminal charges for drug crimes or any other offense. Contact Tracy Tiernan in Tulsa, Oklahoma to discuss your case.