Nebraska’s Lancaster County Attorney’s Office Launches Groundbreaking Initiative to Promote Racial Equity in the Criminal Justice System

Partnership with the Vera Institute of Justice to Study Prosecutorial Discretion

LINCOLN, NEB. – Prosecutors possess enormous power and make critical decisions that affect defendants and victims at every stage of the criminal justice process, including charging, bail recommendations, plea bargaining, and sentencing. When outcomes disproportionately affect people of certain racial or ethnic backgrounds, it is essential that those disparities be identified so solutions can be developed.

Nebraska’s Lancaster County Attorney’s Office is committed to protecting the safety and rights of the people it serves by ensuring that its actions are just and equitable. To this end, the office has partnered with the Vera Institute of Justice (Vera) on a project to proactively study the exercise of prosecutorial discretion. Through rigorous research and evidence-based practice, Vera’s Prosecution and Racial Justice Program (PRJ) will offer the Lancaster County Attorney’s Office the means to monitor its aggregate decisions and ensure that prosecutorial authority is applied fairly and consistently. “I believe this initiative will lead to lasting improvements in the quality and fairness of prosecutorial decisions made in this office,” said Lancaster County Attorney Joe Kelly. This project is also supported by the Lincoln Community Foundation.

Over the next year, the Lancaster County Attorney’s Office will provide PRJ researchers access to statistical data that will lead to a set of findings and recommendations addressing the exercise of prosecutorial discretion along a continuum of decision points in the criminal justice process. PRJ will work collaboratively with its partner to analyze this data and, if warranted, assist in developing routine policies and practices that promote fairness. 

“Vera is proud to work with a new generation of prosecutorial leadership across the nation, and we believe that the results of our work with the Lancaster County Attorney’s Office will lead to a fairer, more equitable justice system for all residents of that jurisdiction,” said Whitney Tymas, director of Vera’s Prosecution and Racial Justice program.

To date, PRJ has partnered successfully with prosecutors' offices in Milwaukee, WI, Charlotte, NC, San Diego, CA, and New York, NY. In addition to Lancaster County, it is commencing work with the San Francisco, CA District Attorney’s Office in 2014.