I think it's a pretty consistent finding in the research. Again, I think mandatory minimums are predicated on the idea of consistency and predictability, and it kind of breaks those mechanisms or at least challenges them in may ways. A pretty consistent finding is that there are lots of disparities by region and by courtroom, and also a higher concentration of people overrepresented.... In the United States, the U.S. sentencing commission found that African Americans were more likely to receive mandatory minimums.
I guess the way I would look at that isn't necessarily to accuse the system of being malign in some ways. I think it's the work of implicit bias, and that's also why you want to have reviewable discretion. You want to know how these kinds of decisions are being made so that you can fix them.
When you vest discretion in areas where you can't see that, where you don't have that kind of accountability, that is precisely what allows this kind of discretion to fester.