The recent sentencing of Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort demonstrates again that white-collar defendants in the American legal system get off lightly compared with their street counterparts.

The first sentence meted out to Manafort in Virginia would be seen as entirely misguided by almost all legal experts. Judge Ellis essentially trivialized the seriousness of the charges and politicized them in his fully biased and inappropriate remarks during the trial as due only to the special prosecutor’s quest to get to Trump. The punishment amounted to nothing more than a slap on the wrist.

Manafort’s second sentence in Washington DC given by a more measured jurist was still quite magnanimous given the charges, which included witness tampering, and was well under the maximum penalty of 10 years. Public outrage over the sentences is not surprising. A number of issues are at play that assure that most white-collar offenders will get off lightly; or not be caught at all.

Public outrage over the sentences is not surprising

First, consider that Paul Manafort, who the Virginia judge erroneously concluded led a “blameless life” would still be committing major financial frauds had he not put himself in the spotlight by volunteering to run Trump’s campaign. Little did he know that he would end up in the crosshairs of a special prosecutor’s investigation looking into Russian connections in the election, and even if he had thought of it, he might not have cared much. He had committed numerous major financial crimes, they were well-hidden, and he had cleverly avoided legal scrutiny in the past.

He had successfully played the limited capacity of the legal system to identify complex financial schemes, and to investigate and sanction them. Like others of his ilk, his illusion of invulnerability allowed him to commit major white-collar crimes with impunity. If he had not been in financial debt to Russian oligarchs, Manafort would not have had to volunteer as a campaign manager in order to sell political favors, and would likely never have come under any prosecutorial scrutiny at all.

Both sentences show the favorable results that can be attained by wealthy high-status defendants who can afford a bevy of very talented defense lawyers. Lower-end punishments can also be seen in relation to other less powerful white-collar offenders as well as to street criminals.

For example, simply compare Manfort’s 7.5-year sentence to the Fyre Festival co-founder Billy McFarland’s sentence of six years for what most would consider far less serious crimes regarding wire fraud, false ticket sales and misrepresentation. Even he was able to dodge a 15-year sentence sought by the prosecution. The sophisticated “starched” white-collar criminal fared practically the same as the music festival organizer who the judge referred to as a “serial fraudster”. The same label could have applied to Manafort, only for more serious and costly offenses.

Americans had long suspected about the institutions that dominate our lives: that they are neither fair nor unbiased and favor the wealthy at every step

These results aren’t entirely surprising. Criminological research demonstrates that white-collar defendants are likely to fare well compared with lower-status offenders. In a study of doctors convicted of fraud in California, for example, it was found that physicians were sanctioned significantly less than other first-time offenders who, on average, stole 10 times less. Similarly, during the savings and loan crisis a well-cited study showed that major financial fraudsters fared significantly better than federal offenders convicted of far less costly property crimes.

Public outrage at the sentences of powerful white-collar criminals such as Manafort, more broadly indicates the normalization of such acts before the legal system, and highlights the need to understand the pernicious nature of the offenses and to take them more seriously. Since such crimes must be proactively policed by persons well-trained to do so, that means funding regulatory and policing agencies at much higher levels as well as sustained attention toward effective policies to induce compliance with the law.

Just a few days after Manafort was sentenced another national scandal emerged when the justice department charged 50 individuals for their participation in a college admissions cheating scam. Wealthy parents paid a consultant to bribe athletic coaches, falsify test scores and even submit doctored photos of their children’s athletic bodies in order for them to gain admission to elite colleges and universities.

That scandal may seem less significant than Manafort’s, but has similar implications. Both cases, widely covered by the media, confirmed what many Americans had long suspected about the institutions that dominate our lives: that they are neither fair nor unbiased and favor the wealthy at every step.