"This report examines the civil rights of women in United States prisons. The population of women in prison has increased dramatically since the 1980s, and this growth has outpaced that of men in prison, yet there have been few national-level studies of the civil rights issues incarcerated women experience. The Commission studied a range of issues that impact incarcerated women, including deprivations of women’s medical needs that may violate the constitutional requirement to provide adequate medical care for all prisoners; implementation of the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA); and the sufficiency of programs to meet women’s needs after release. The Commission also examined disparities in discipline practices for women in prison compared with men, and the impacts of incarcerated women being placed far from home or having their parental rights terminated."
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Showing posts with label incarcerated women. Show all posts
Showing posts with label incarcerated women. Show all posts
Soaring Female Population, Racial Disparities Drive State Incareration Numbers
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"Although America’s world-beating incarceration rates have begun to decline, soaring female jail populations and stark racial disparities in state prisons continue to present a formidable challenge to policymakers."
Link to Interactive Map
"Although America’s world-beating incarceration rates have begun to decline, soaring female jail populations and stark racial disparities in state prisons continue to present a formidable challenge to policymakers."
Women's Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie
"This report provides a first-of-its-kind detailed view of the 219,000 women incarcerated in the United States, and how they fit into the even larger picture of correctional control. Since 2014, the Prison Policy Initiative has quantified the number of people incarcerated in the United States, and calculated the breakdown of people held by each correctional system by offense in an annual Whole Pie: Mass Incarceration report. This report, done in collaboration with the ACLU’s Campaign for Smart Justice, finally provides similar data on women incarcerated in the Unites States. We break the data down to show the various correctional systems that control women, and to examine why women in the various systems of confinement are locked up."
"This report provides a first-of-its-kind detailed view of the 219,000 women incarcerated in the United States, and how they fit into the even larger picture of correctional control. Since 2014, the Prison Policy Initiative has quantified the number of people incarcerated in the United States, and calculated the breakdown of people held by each correctional system by offense in an annual Whole Pie: Mass Incarceration report. This report, done in collaboration with the ACLU’s Campaign for Smart Justice, finally provides similar data on women incarcerated in the Unites States. We break the data down to show the various correctional systems that control women, and to examine why women in the various systems of confinement are locked up."
The Mental Health Crisis Facing Women in Prison
"More than two-thirds of incarcerated women in America reported having a history of mental health problems — a far higher percentage than their male counterparts, according to a study released Thursday by the Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Although the prevalence of mental health disorders among people in prisons and jails is a well-known problem, the dramatic gender disparity exposed in the new report has been less discussed.
The survey, conducted from February 2011 to March 2012, asked more than 100,000 men and women in hundreds of U.S. jails and prisons whether they had ever been diagnosed by a mental health professional with a psychological disorder such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, post-traumatic stress disorder or anxiety. The survey also posed questions about inmates’ mood and emotions in the previous 30 days.
Thirty-nine percent of those surveyed said they had been diagnosed with a mental health condition. About 19 percent experienced an episode of serious psychological distress in the month before being surveyed.
When the data is broken down by gender, the differences are stark."
View the Report
"More than two-thirds of incarcerated women in America reported having a history of mental health problems — a far higher percentage than their male counterparts, according to a study released Thursday by the Bureau of Justice Statistics.
Although the prevalence of mental health disorders among people in prisons and jails is a well-known problem, the dramatic gender disparity exposed in the new report has been less discussed.
The survey, conducted from February 2011 to March 2012, asked more than 100,000 men and women in hundreds of U.S. jails and prisons whether they had ever been diagnosed by a mental health professional with a psychological disorder such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, post-traumatic stress disorder or anxiety. The survey also posed questions about inmates’ mood and emotions in the previous 30 days.
Thirty-nine percent of those surveyed said they had been diagnosed with a mental health condition. About 19 percent experienced an episode of serious psychological distress in the month before being surveyed.
When the data is broken down by gender, the differences are stark."
View the Report
Prisons
Women Inmates On The Rise
The number of women in federal prisons could go up with the abolition of early parole provisions by the federal government, according to a University of Toronto criminology professor.
The number and proportion of female inmates had been increasing in both provincial and federal prisons even before the parole changes.....
And with the end of the federal accelerated parole system, the numbers could go even higher, says Kelly Hannah-Moffat, a professor and director of the Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies at U of T.
Beyond Youth Custody. Resettlement Of Girls And Young Women: Research Report
This report addresses a worrying gap in the knowledge about the effective resettlement of girls and young women. Reviewing research literature in a number of relevant areas, it cross-references evidence of what works in the resettlement of young people with what we know about the wider need of girls and young women. This iterative synthesis approach thus provides a gender-sensitive approach to inform policy and practice development in resettlement for this specific group.
In New York's Largest Jail, Teens Face "Brute Force" And Intimidation That Horrifies Even Prosecutors
In the second-largest jail in the nation, teens are beaten more frequently than not. They are placed in solitary confinement for disciplinary infractions that would be considered typical adolescent behavior outside of jail. And inmates, medical staff, and even teachers, are intimidated out of reporting violence by corrections officers, according to a scathing new Department of Justice report.
Read the Dept. of Justice Report
This New Jersey Reform Stops Judges From Jailing Some Defendants Just Because They Are Poor
In New Jersey, inmates spend an average of ten months behind bars just waiting to go to trial. Many have the option to post bail. But a study last year found that some 40 percent of those in pretrial detention would have been released had they been able to afford bail.
On Monday, the New Jersey legislature passed a package of bills to remove financial need from bail determinations, with the strong support of Gov. Chris Christie (R).
Holder: Data-Driven Prison Sentencing "Unfair" To Minorities
Attorney General Eric Holder on Friday expressed concern about the fairness of judges who rely on big data to sentence criminal defendants, saying the use of such “risk assessments” in several states could exacerbate racial disparities among the prison population.
Holder, who made the comments during a Philadelphia speech to criminal defense lawyers, said the use of such data results in unfair treatment of minorities.
New support for released prisoners in south Etobicoke http://t.co/PhFp5k54Yn via @torontostar
— Crim Library UTL (@CrimLib) August 4, 2014
Women Inmates On The Rise
The number of women in federal prisons could go up with the abolition of early parole provisions by the federal government, according to a University of Toronto criminology professor.
The number and proportion of female inmates had been increasing in both provincial and federal prisons even before the parole changes.....
And with the end of the federal accelerated parole system, the numbers could go even higher, says Kelly Hannah-Moffat, a professor and director of the Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies at U of T.
Beyond Youth Custody. Resettlement Of Girls And Young Women: Research Report
This report addresses a worrying gap in the knowledge about the effective resettlement of girls and young women. Reviewing research literature in a number of relevant areas, it cross-references evidence of what works in the resettlement of young people with what we know about the wider need of girls and young women. This iterative synthesis approach thus provides a gender-sensitive approach to inform policy and practice development in resettlement for this specific group.
In New York's Largest Jail, Teens Face "Brute Force" And Intimidation That Horrifies Even Prosecutors
In the second-largest jail in the nation, teens are beaten more frequently than not. They are placed in solitary confinement for disciplinary infractions that would be considered typical adolescent behavior outside of jail. And inmates, medical staff, and even teachers, are intimidated out of reporting violence by corrections officers, according to a scathing new Department of Justice report.
Read the Dept. of Justice Report
This New Jersey Reform Stops Judges From Jailing Some Defendants Just Because They Are Poor
In New Jersey, inmates spend an average of ten months behind bars just waiting to go to trial. Many have the option to post bail. But a study last year found that some 40 percent of those in pretrial detention would have been released had they been able to afford bail.
On Monday, the New Jersey legislature passed a package of bills to remove financial need from bail determinations, with the strong support of Gov. Chris Christie (R).
Holder: Data-Driven Prison Sentencing "Unfair" To Minorities
Attorney General Eric Holder on Friday expressed concern about the fairness of judges who rely on big data to sentence criminal defendants, saying the use of such “risk assessments” in several states could exacerbate racial disparities among the prison population.
Holder, who made the comments during a Philadelphia speech to criminal defense lawyers, said the use of such data results in unfair treatment of minorities.
The Changing Racial Dynamics of Women’s Incarceration
In the first decade of the 21st century the United States began to experience a shift in the 30 - year buildup to a world record prison system. Although the decade ended with an increased number of people in prison, the rate of growth overall was considerably below that of previous decades and since 2008 the overall number of people in state prisons has declined slightly each year.
Scholars are beginning to analyze the relative contributions of changes in crime rates, criminal justice policies, economics, and demographics to the slowing growth rate of the prison system, but one area that has gone largely unexplored is the impact of such changes on racial disparities in imprisonment. As is well known black/white disparities in the use of incarceration have been profound for quite some time. Since the 1980s a series of analyses have documented these trends at the national level as
Scholars are beginning to analyze the relative contributions of changes in crime rates, criminal justice policies, economics, and demographics to the slowing growth rate of the prison system, but one area that has gone largely unexplored is the impact of such changes on racial disparities in imprisonment. As is well known black/white disparities in the use of incarceration have been profound for quite some time. Since the 1980s a series of analyses have documented these trends at the national level as
well as examining variation in disparity among the states.
1
As prison populations fluctuate, though, the relative rate of incarceration among racial groups may or may not reflect prevailing patterns. Further, as the prospect of a declining prison population has now become a distinct possibility for the next decade, it will become increasingly important to monitor whether reduced incarceration is experienced in similar ways across racial/ethnic groups.
This is from the Sentencing Project. Tom
Is Prison Worse for Women?
In case you missed it, the Jan. 30 issue of The New Yorker contained a powerful essay by Adam Gopnik on the staggering number of people (disproportionally of color) we have imprisoned—often, with sentences absurdly out of whack with the severity of their crimes—in this country. Here’s a brief taste:
Over all, there are now more people under “correctional supervision” in America—more than six million—than were in the Gulag Archipelago under Stalin at its height. That city of the confined and the controlled, Lockuptown, is now the second largest in the United States.
Gopnik goes on to trace the intellectual history of our contemporary zeal for lengthy, impersonal, probably ineffective confinements, concluding that what’s needed is not a revolutionary throwing-over of the prison system, but instead a concerted, multifaceted effort to starve the beast though small measures: for example, the legalization and regulation of marijuana.
While this is all very compelling, one thing is missing from Gopnik’s harrowing portrait of “Lockuptown”—he doesn’t really acknowledge that city’s female residents.
Pregnant, in Prison and Denied Care
By Rachel Roth
Over the past year, incarcerated women and their allies have achieved a remarkable string of victories against inhumane treatment. First, they persuaded the Bureau of Prisons to issue a new policy in October 2008 limiting the use of restraints on women who are in labor, giving birth or recovering after childbirth; the Marshals Service, which transports people in federal custody, followed suit. Next, they won legislation in the spring and summer of 2009 restricting the use of restraints on pregnant women in New Mexico, Texas and New York. Finally, they successfully petitioned the US Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit for a rehearing of the full court in a case from Arkansas, which resulted in a ruling in October that shackling women in labor is unconstitutional.These developments send a strong signal to the rest of the country to stop subjecting women to this dangerous and degrading practice. But what happens to pregnant women in prison before they wind up in chains at a hospital?
When women are brought to a hospital in shackles, the pain and humiliation they endure likely caps months of difficulty from being pregnant behind bars, months without adequate prenatal care or nutrition, or even basics like a bed to sleep on or clothes to accommodate their changing shape.
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