What crimes have the largest racial disparities in arrest or conviction rates?

1. Drug crimes: the clearest and largest disparity

Multiple researchers and advocacy groups identify drug possession and distribution arrests and convictions as among the most racially skewed outcomes in the criminal legal system: people of color make up a disproportionate share of drug convictions and state prisons for drug offenses even though surveys show similar rates of drug use across races, and the National Registry of Exonerations reports innocent Black defendants are far more likely than innocent whites to be convicted of drug crimes—an estimate described as 19 times more likely—highlighting both arrest and wrongful‑conviction disparities ^{[1] [2]}.

2. Low‑level offenses and policing practices that produce high arrest disparities

“Pretextual” stops, stops for minor offenses, and enforcement of low‑level public‑order laws generate dense arrest volumes concentrated in communities of color, producing especially large arrest disparities for misdemeanor‑level conduct even where actual offending rates do not differ much by race; studies note that reduced stops can reduce racial disparities without increasing crime, implicating policing strategy rather than underlying crime differences ^{[1] [2]}.

3. Violent crime data: national totals versus local patterns

The national Uniform Crime Reports show white individuals account for the largest share of arrests for violent crimes in aggregate, but scholars and local reports emphasize that homicide and gun‑violence arrests are often geographically concentrated and largely intra‑racial, producing high Black overrepresentation in those categories in many cities and youth statistics—meaning the largest disparities depend on scale and place, not a single national pattern ^{[4] [2]}.

4. Conviction, pretrial, and sentencing disparities amplify arrest gaps

Racial gaps in arrests often widen across charging, plea bargaining, pretrial detention, and sentencing: Black and Hispanic defendants are more likely to be held pretrial, face higher bail, accept less favorable pleas, and receive longer or more punitive sentences in many studies and federal sentencing analyses, so disparities in arrests translate into larger disparities in convictions and incarceration ^{[3] [5]}. The Sentencing Project and the U.S. Sentencing Commission both document persistence of demographic differences in outcomes ^{[6] [5]}.

5. Mixed findings and methodological caveats—what the literature disputes

Empirical work is not unanimous: some legal scholars find lower conviction rates for Black arrestees in certain datasets and emphasize possible over‑arrest as an explanatory mechanism, while others document higher conviction and sentence severity for people of color—this heterogeneity reflects differences in scope, level of analysis (local versus federal), and which stages of the system are measured, so any claim about “largest” disparities must specify offense type and stage of processing ^{[7] [8]}.

6. Explanations, implicit agendas, and limits of available reporting

Explanations advanced in the literature include concentrated poverty, policing practices, prosecutorial discretion, and structural factors such as residential segregation and historical policy decisions (redlining), all of which are cited as contributing factors; advocacy sources highlight systemic bias and call for policy reforms, while government reports aim to quantify disparities to guide policy—this mix of agendas means readers should weigh both advocacy emphasis (Prison Policy, Sentencing Project, NAACP) and official analyses (USSC, FBI, Pew) and recognize that the assembled sources do not settle causation in a single statement ^{[1] [6] [5] [3]}.