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Juror B-37 in the George Zimmerman trial ssaidays race was not a factor in the fatal shooting of 17 year old Trayvon Martin, and even the Prosecutor in the case against Zimmerman was loathe to bring up racial dynamics.

Yet, it was precisely the public outcry over the fact that the shooter of an unarmed young black man initially went free that resulted in his arrest and subsequent charges. Ultimately George Zimmerman who is Latino, was tried by 6 jurors, 5 of whom were white and one Latino, and acquitted of all charges.

Is it possible that what is called by scientists “implicit racism,” affected their decision making? Implicit bias stems not from values we explicitly hold, but stereotypes we subconsciously harbor, even against our best intentions.

Given the tendency of our criminal justice system and even our media and popular culture to disproportionately over-criminalize young black men is it safe to assume there exists a huge amount of implicit racism against that demographic? Indeed studies have proven that that is the case.

GUEST: Calvin Lai, Doctoral Candidate, Department of Psychology at the University of Virginia who works on Project Implicit

Click here to find out more about Project Implicit.