In the United States, there are two systems of justice–one for white people, and one for everyone else. When compared to African- and Hispanic-Americans committing the same crimes, white Americans are less likely to be stopped by the police or arrested in either the adult or juvenile detention systems.

“Depending on who you get–literally which prosecutor you get–you could serve two years in jail or no time at all over a small crime.”

Study after study confirms that bias permeates nearly every level of criminal justice–from arrests to convictions to sentencing–and that includes one group who holds a disproportionate amount of power when it comes to determining the specifics of criminal proceedings. Prosecutors have an absolutely huge amount of discretion in criminal cases, including power to determine whether to charge a defendant with a crime, the length of prison terms, and the specifics of plea deals. That last one is especially crucial considering that the vast majority of defendants–more than 90%–never go to trial, meaning that it’s often up to a single prosecutor to decide how justice plays out.

“Depending on who you get–literally which prosecutor you get–you could serve two years in jail or no time at all over a small crime,” says Shima Baughman, a professor at the University of Utah College of Law. “I don’t think people really understand how this system works.”

Just like in every other area of the criminal justice system, bias rears its ugly head in plea bargaining deals and other prosecutorial decisions. White Americans, for example, are less likely to spend time in jail awaiting trial. By contrast, black Americans are more likely to have their probation revoked and receive plea deals that include prison time, while whites receive, on average, prison sentences that are about 10% shorter than those of racial minorities facing the same offenses.

Measuring how biased prosecutor offices are is tough since offices aren’t required to collect or report that kind of data. A paper published in the journal Behavioral Science and Policy proposes an alternative solution–when possible, take race out of the equation entirely. Co-authored by Baughman and University of Arizona law professor Christopher Robertson, the paper proposes using automated electronic systems, paralegals, or other intermediaries to remove references to the race of the defendant prior to the prosecutor reviewing the case file. In a phone interview, Baughman added that the race of the victim(s) could also be removed as well as information on which neighborhood the crime occurred in. While prosecutors may figure out a defendant’s race at some point in the legal process, blinding during the early stages could reduce bias in both decisions about what crimes to charge them with and what kind of plea bargain deals they’re offered, says Sunita Sah, a behavioral ethics researcher at Cornell University and the paper’s lead author.

“Just a slight reduction in bias could have huge effects, not just on people in prison, but also an effect on families and society in general.”

“Just a slight reduction in bias could have huge effects, not just on people in prison, but also an effect on families and society in general,” Sah says, adding that reducing bias could also improve the perceived legitimacy of the legal system. Sah’s paper is just a proposal and did not measure current bias levels or evaluate the impact blinding prosecutors might have. “We need to pilot it and really see how this would work in the field,” she says.

Blinding is already used in some areas of the criminal justice system, like eyewitness identifications. To prevent arresting officers from providing nonverbal cues that may guide an eyewitness to a certain suspect, lineups are frequently conducted by a law enforcement agent who has no knowledge of the case. In 2014, the National Academy of Sciences recommended that agencies institute double-blind lineups wherein neither the lineup administrator nor the witness knows which photo is the real suspect, or if the suspect is among the array of photos at all. Many agencies have adopted the practice, though it’s not legally required. To reduce bias in federal capital cases (which are the minority as most capital cases are overseen by states), the Department of Justice requires the U.S. Attorney’s Office to remove information about the defendant’s race and ethnicity before submitting the case to the review committee that determines whether to seek the death penalty.