Opinion polls report that the pubic is increasingly critical of perceived judicini leniency in sentencing. To eXamille the degree and pattern of judicial leniency, Illinois judges and laypersons were asked to impose sentences on the same offenders. Contrary to the myth of judicial leniency, the .sentences given by laypersons tended to be equal to or less severe than those given by judges. Explanations are offered for the divergence between myth and reality, including the availability heuristic and the impact of biased recall.
Opinion polls consistently show a public concerned with crime and dissatisfied with the way the justice system responds to crime. In particular, a large majority of citizens questioned in national public opinion polls report that courts are too lenient (Flanagan, McGarrell, & Brown, 1985) and as many as 83% say that judges do not deal harshly enough with criminals (Flanagan & McLeod, 1983, To identify the sources and contours of this apparent disagreement between the public and the judges who impose criminal sentences, we examined the sentences that lay and judicial respondents gave to a series of offenders. The pp. 248-249).