The U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics released the latest data on the nation’s correctional population right before Christmas, and there was some big news: the correctional population declined in 2009 for the first time since BJS began tracking its size in 1980. Given steadily decreasing rates of growth, I suppose a year of negative growth was inevitable. Still, the 2009 data strike me as a notable milestone.
The correctional population is comprised of four groups: prison inmates (1.5 million), jail inmates (0.8 million), parolees (0.8 million), and probationers (4.2 million).
Of the four categories, all but the number of prison inmates declined from 2008 to 2009. Leading the way in percentage decline was the jail population, which was down 2.2 percent.
The BJS report does not attempt to suggest reasons for the decline, but the jail data are consistent with what I would expect to see during a time of extraordinary budgetary pressures on state and local government. Jails and prisons are very expensive to run, so there are powerful fiscal incentives to reduce the populations. However, jail populations are much easier to reduce in the short term than prison populations, for reasons both administrative (prison sentences are much longer than jail sentences, so changes in front-end policies and practices take much longer to manifest themselves in a significant way in prison numbers) and political (prison inmates tend to have more serious criminal records than jail inmates, and no one wants another Willie Horton). I am familiar with efforts here in Milwaukee to reduce the size of our jail population, which is a significant drain on local government funds, and I imagine similar initiatives have been undertaken across the country since the recession began, which may be reflected in the 2009 BJS data.
Although the prison population did not decline in 2009, it did register its smallest annual increase since 2000. Interestingly, the state prison population did decline slightly (0.4 percent), but that decrease was more than offset by a rather startling increase in the size of the federal prison population (up 3.4 percent). I’m not sure what explains that increase. Is it another indication of the federal obliviousness to the sorts of fiscal pressures that state and local governments must deal with?
In any event, the overall 2009 data are in line with long-term trends in the correctional population. The number of Americans under criminal justice supervision skyrocketed in the 1980’s. (This increase closely corresponds with a contemporaneous decrease in the number of Americans held in mental health institutions — what a fascinating story lies in that shift!) Annual increases in the size of the correctional population often approached or exceeded ten percent. In the 1990’s, however, annual increases were almost always below five percent. Since 2000, the annual increases have typically been below two percent. Perhaps the 2009 data give us a preview of what the new decade of the 2010’s will hold in store.
But here is a sobering fact: even following the 2009 decline, one out of every thirty-two adults in this country is under criminal justice supervision.
Cross posted at Life Sentences Blog.
It’s difficult to muster much excitement about the slight drop in the number of incarcerated Americans. As Professor O’Hear correctly points out, it seems to be prompted chiefly by fiscal considerations. Jails and prisons cost the state lots of money. I see no concomitant rethinking of the inhumanity of dumping large numbers of Americans, most of whom are poor members of minority groups, in dangerous warehouses in which rehabilitation has ceased to be a goal. Our nation’s over-reliance on incarceration as the preferred form of criminal punishment and the way we run our prisons and jails is truly embarrassing.
I agree with David Papke. Because the United States has by far the largest population of prisoners, it has at least contributed to our dwindling reputation as a powerful nation. How can a nation be secure when so many of its own citizens are barred from the rest of society? In Europe, the British press has identified the U.S. as the “Incarceration Nation”.
The problem is not that the citizens of the U.S. are out of control — if anything, there is too much control of citizens — the problem is that the government is out of control. The people have no voice. If we want to reduce crime, our legislators need to stop creating it and start introducing legislation that benefits all members of society. The logical place to start is with our drug laws.
Two studies (Stanford 2003-04; UCLA 2005-06) have shown that the majority of those who become routine illicit drug users directly after a brief period of experimentation are self-medicating legitimate medical disorders that have been left undiagnosed or simply untreated. Although this is often due to the lack of patient access to health care, the failure of health care providers to treat their patients’ medical disorders should be alarming to everyone. In the 21st century, providers are frequently intimidated by drug laws that threaten their licenses to practice medicine and possibly result in their own incarceration for diagnosis of a medical disorder that requires a Schedule II or III drug. Patients associated with “high risk” minority groups — such as African-American males or gay men with HIV/AIDS — are repeatedly denied treatment for their medical disorders. Meanwhile, wealthy white heterosexual married middle-aged women have no problem obtaining prescription medication for disorders that are often improperly diagnosed. Today, our prisons are filled with people like Richard Paey, a white heterosexual married-with-kids former Philadelphia lawyer whose involvement in an automobile accident left him confined to a wheelchair and in constant pain. Arrested for large quantities of OxyContin, Mr. Paey was sentenced to 25 years in prison in 2004. Because of his race, background, obvious disability, and massive international media attention including letter-writing campaigns, Mr. Paey was lucky enough to be pardoned after 3.5 years when he should have never even been detained by law enforcement. There are thousands of Richard Paey’s still serving time for crimes that everyone knows they did not commit.
Adding up the costs of law enforcement, including the DEA, the expenses of the judicial system, the “correctional” institutions that are merely crime colleges, and the burden on employers, American taxpayers are doling out about $100,000 a year on each inmate. That’s without considering the cost of planning new “correctional” facilities. When we release prisoners, they cannot find jobs and so they return to criminal behavior. These are U.S. citizens who are no different from you or me. They are not criminals. The real crime is taking place in our government institutions.
It is not only about drugs either. In Palm Springs, CA, the result of a June 2009 entrapment of 19 gay men is just now deciding their fate. None of these men did anything wrong except to be lured by the Palm Springs Police Department to the brink of outdoor sexual encounters. The Chief of Police has resigned — a wise move — but if they truly respect the Constitution of the U.S., so should all of the police officers involved, and the innocent citizens should be pardoned. How far have we come from 1692 Salem . . . ? If there was a death penalty for these contrived crimes, make no mistake, it would be applied!