>I also believe that upper-middle-class white males will have much more success in exercising that right than members of other societal groups will.

There is overwhelming evidence that women are treated more leniently, not men. Here is one example: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2144002

"...large gender gaps favoring women throughout the sentence length distribution (averaging over 60%), conditional on arrest offense, criminal history, and other pre-charge observables. Female arrestees are also significantly likelier to avoid charges and convictions entirely, and twice as likely to avoid incarceration if convicted."