IEA: Criminal Justice
Criminal Justice Facts:
- At year end 1999, 6.3 million people were on probation, in jail or prison or on parole - 3.1% of all U.S. adults.*
- If the incarceration rate remains the same, 1 out of every 20 persons will serve time in prison.*
- There is a higher chance of men (9%) being incarcerated than women (1.1%).*
Black males have a 16.2% chance of being incarcerated.*
Hispanic males have a 9.4% chance of being incarcerated.*
White men have a 2.5% chance of being incarcerated.* - 1 out of 4 jail inmates have been treated for a mental or emotional problem at some time.*
- There are 8 times as many mentally ill people in prisons as there are in state mental hospitals
("Are Killers Born or Made?" Biography Magazine, Sept. 2000) - 49% of prisoners in the United States have not finished high school.
- 48% of jailed women reported having been physically or sexually abused prior to admission. 27% had been raped.
- 8 in 10 inmates serving time in State prison for intimate violence had injured or killed their victim.*
- 23 U.S States permit the Death Penalty to be used as a sentence for Juvenile crime.
(Coordinating Council: On Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention
John Wilson Department of Justice website November 2001) - In 1999 20 states executed 98 prisoners. 93 by Lethal injection, 3 by the electric chair and 1 by gas chamber. Only 13 states do not have the death penalty.
(Capital Punishment 1999, Tracey L. Snell Department of Justice website) - In the U.S., as of May 2001, 88 persons, in 22 states, including 10 death row inmates, have been exonerated by use of DNA tests
(The ACLU Website www.aclu.org/death-penalty/DNATesting.html) - More than 7 out of every 10 jail inmates had prior sentences or probation or incarceration.
- Every year in the United States, 2.3 million kids under he age of 18 are arrested for crimes from shoplifting to murder.*
- Crime statistics taken by the Bureau of Justice Statistics records data from criminals ages 12 and up.*
- New York City spends $8,000 per year for each student's education in the South Bronx.
New York City spends $64,000 per year to house each inmate serving time in Rikers Island (Jonathan Kozol, Oct. 17th, 2000). - In 1992, 537,000 black males were enrolled in higher education. 583,000 black males were incarcerated.
* Statistics collected from www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/
Literature:
- Criminal Injustice: Confronting the Prison Crisis
edited by Edward Humes - Deadly Consequences
by Deborah Prothrow-Stith, M.D. - Fist Stick Knife Gun
by Geoffery Canada - The Farm: Life Inside a Women's Prison
by Andi Rierden
To Volunteer:
Contact our Volunteer Information and Placement Team at wehaveissues@umich.edu, or criminal justice team at cjserve@umich.edu, or visit our office at 1024 Hill Street (corner of Hill and East University) 936-2437
.