Earl Ofari Hutchinson
Sean Saunders cast yet another ugly racial glare on a criminal justice system faultline. In fact, the glare is cast on several racial faults. Saunders is an African American U.S. Navy and Army veteran. In 2023, he was arrested on a child involved case in Georgia. Eventually prosecutors declined to press further charges.
However, that did not end Saunders troubles. He was then arrested by authorities in Cherokee County, Alabama. The charges were the same. But the disposition of the case was not. He was incarcerated in a county detention facility. He was slapped with a $100,000 bail. He has been held there since March 2024. A hearing was scheduled for December 2025.
This will mark nearly two years that Saunders has been incarcerated. There is no indication just how the Cherokee County District Attorney Summer M. Summerford will press the case.
Rearrest, prolonged incarceration, astronomical bill, no indication of the ultimate disposition of the case. This has sparked justifiable outrage among Saunder’s family and friends.
Saunders plight is hardly an aberration. The excessive bail, and long stretches in holding facilities without trial, and clouded charges has been the perennial story for thousands of Black men. A 2017 Bureau of Justice study found that young African American males are far more likely to languish in a jail cell before trial than white defendants. They are more likely to be slapped with higher bail, sometimes double than white defendants. They are less likely to have the cash or means to make bail. The Saunders family had to establish a GoFundMe fund to raise money for his criminal defense.
That’s only the start of the chronic racial double standard. Black men face colossal challenges in dealing with family and child cases. They are more likely to be accused of a variety of child related abuses. They are far less likely to have these kinds of allegations and potential charges dealt with in a civil proceeding than white males. The likelihood of arrest, and prosecution with the standard inflated pretrial or prehearing bail is more often than not their fate.
Saunders is fortunate in one sense. He has garnered strong support from family members and friends. He was able to retain a private attorney. However, that does not alter the fact that a young Black father has been removed for months perhaps years from his children and family. It does not alter the fact that the hideous racial faultlines that entrap Black men in child cases entrapped Saunders, as well as the many other Saunders. This will always be more than ample cause for both outrage and action.
Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. He is President of The Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable a civil rights and social justice advocacy organization