This paper demonstrates persistent gender gaps in jury verdicts and judge sentences for more than 200,000 trials spanning 200 years at London’s Old Bailey Central Criminal Court.
Females were up to 20% less likely to be found guilty and around 14% less likely to receive the harshest punishment available (death, transportation, or prison). We demonstrate that the gender gaps are unlikely to be explained by observable or unobservable differences in case characteristics, statistical discrimination, and a preference to protect ‘mothers’. We find some evidence that the so-called girlfriend theory and preference-based discrimination may explain at least part of the gap.