Race, social and economic status, level of education, location of crime, and pure chance play significant roles in the legal processes which send some defendants to prison, others to death. Offenders who commit similar crimes under similar circumstances have received widely differing sentences. In almost all jurisdictions throughout the United States, the prosecutor is an elected official. It is the prosecutor who decides whether to seek the death penalty. Some prosecutors call for capital punishment only if a case is widely publicized, a focus of community pressure, or an issue among defense attorneys or local police.
Some prosecutors demonstrate racial bias in their decisions to seek the death penalty.
Prosecutors settle many cases through plea bargaining. More culpable defendants at high risk of receiving a death sentence often plea bargain in return for a reduced sentence. Their less culpable accomplices, however, may receive the death penalty. Race, social and economic status, location of crime, and pure chance may be deciding factors in death sentencing. In addition, prosecutors seek the death penalty far more frequently when the victim of the homicide is white than when the victim is black.