Short "yes/no" answer: no..
Longer answer: possibly yes..
Even longer answer: It's definitely case specific, whether it should weigh in on sentencing, as "social justice" may well be proven in a court of law, to have had influence on a persons "skillset" and therefore impacting ability/capability to navigate society..
SJ basically have nothing to do with race, but the concept have definitely been hijacked by people wanting to twist it into certain uses.
Example: some negro without a criminal record (pls use your imagination) loots goods from say Armani worth $800 vs some poor negro (possibly with prior crimes) burglarizes food for the same amount of money, because documented unfortunate situation and resulting hunger..
I'd advocate leniency in sentencing for the latter, on basis of social justice.
Why use negroes as examples? Because negroes appear before US judges statistically more often (percentage of race total head-count caught doing criminal acts) than any other race..
I don’t think that applying the circumstances to a sentence qualifies as social justice. I think certainly it’s common for judges to take what was stolen and why into account when rendering a verdict. When I hear this senator’s question, I think it’s more like:
Poor negro steals a tv; drop charges because “poor negro.”
Middle class white guy steals the same tv; convicted because “privilege.”
It's surely widely applicated the way you say and thus the term is misinterpreted to fit other agendas, beyond reasonable limits for it..
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