Prior research documents widespread deficiencies in the quality and completeness of official criminal records in the United States. In an era when the social reach of criminal records has expanded to an unprecedented degree, these deficiencies carry serious consequences for criminal record subjects. The present study develops the concept of punitive ambiguity to characterize the burdens of incomplete criminal records and examines how they vary at the state level, providing evidence that punitive ambiguity is racially patterned. Using data from the biennial Surveys of State Criminal History Information Systems, multivariate analyses find that states where African Americans make up larger shares of felony record populations report rap sheet dispositions at significantly lower levels, pairing low criminal record data quality with extensive legally-mandated background screening. The results carry implications for understanding the racialized burdens of a criminal record, as well as broader processes in the development of the American penal state that combine harsh formal punishments with chronic administrative neglect.

先前的研究证明了美国官方犯罪记录的质量和完整性方面普遍存在缺陷。在犯罪记录的社会影响力达到空前程度的时代，这些缺陷给犯罪记录主体带来了严重的后果。本研究提出了惩罚性歧义的概念，以表征不完整的犯罪记录的负担，并研究它们在州一级的变化，从而提供了惩罚性歧义是种族模式的证据。利用两年一次的《国家犯罪历史信息系统调查》中的数据，多变量分析发现，在重罪记录人口中，非裔美国人所占比例较大的州报告说唱乐句的处置水平要低得多，将低犯罪记录数据质量与广泛的法定背景筛选结合起来。结果对理解犯罪记录中种族化的负担以及在美国刑法制国家发展中将严厉的正式处罚与长期的行政疏忽相结合的更广泛的过程具有启示意义。