Methamphetamine Offenders Facing Mandatory Minimums, By Race/Ethnicity and Gender

"The demographic characteristics for methamphetamine offenders convicted of an offense carrying a mandatory minimum penalty differ from those observed for most other major drug types in two ways. First, more than half (51.3%, n=1,776) of methamphetamine offenders convicted of an offense carrying a mandatory minimum penalty are White and another 42.6 percent (n=1,476) are Hispanic. Black methamphetamine offenders constitute only 2.2 percent (n=77) of the methamphetamine offenders convicted of an offense carrying a mandatory minimum penalty. This is the smallest proportion of Black offenders for any major drug type.⁶⁷⁵ In contrast, Other Race offenders constitute 3.8 percent (n=132) of the methamphetamine offenders convicted of an offense carrying a mandatory minimum penalty, which is the largest proportion of Other Race offenders for any drug type.
"Second, female offenders accounted for 18.1 percent (n=627) of all methamphetamine offenders convicted of an offense carrying a mandatory minimum penalty. Although this not a large percentage, it is higher than both the proportion of female offenders in the overall population of drug offenders convicted of an offense carrying a mandatory minimum penalty (10.2%, n=1,611) and the proportion of female offenders convicted of an offense carrying a mandatory minimum penalty for any other drug type.⁶⁷⁶"