African Americans and the Correctional System

 
Source: Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics: http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/1995/pdf/t62.pdf

Correctional Supervision

• At the end of 2002, 6.7 million people in the United States were on probation, in jail or prison, or on parole.  This represented 3.1% of the nation’s resident adults, or 1 in every 32 adults. Of those under correctional supervision, 1,277,127 were in state prisons, and 163,528 were under federal jurisdiction.  Local jails held or supervised 737,912 persons awaiting trial or serving a sentence at mid-year 2002.
  
• Black males (586,700) outnumbered white males (436,800) and Hispanic males (235,000) among inmates with sentences of more than 1 year at year end 2002. Black inmates represented an estimated 45% of all inmates with sentences of more than 1 year, while white inmates accounted for 34% and Hispanic inmates 18%.
  
• At the end of 2002 there were 3,437 sentenced black male prisoners per 100,000 black males in the United States, compared to 1,176 sentenced Hispanic male inmates per 100,000 Hispanic males and 450 white male inmates per 100,000 white males.
  
• Between 1985 and 1997, the percentage of adults under correctional supervision increased for both African Americans (73%) and whites (67%).  African Americans, however, experienced a larger increase than whites over this period.  That nearly doubled the gap between the percentages of African Americans and whites under correctional supervision.
  
• In 2000, African Americans were 13% of the resident population, but they represented 44% of all convicted federal offenders.  Among those convicted of federal offenses, 80.2% of African Americans incarcerated, compared to 74.3 % of whites similarly convicted.
  
• As of December 31, 2002, black males from 20 to 39 years old accounted for about a third of all sentenced prison inmates under state or federal jurisdiction. On that date 10.4 percent of the country's black male population between the age of 25 to 29 were in prison, compared to 2.4 percent of Hispanic males and 1.2 percent of white males in the same age group.

-Source: Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics Online  http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/ascii/llgsfp.txt

Lifetime Likelihood of Going to Prison

• Based on incarceration rates from 1991, an estimated 5.1% of all persons in the United States will serve time in a state or federal prison during their lifetime.  Nearly two thirds of those admitted to prison for the first time will have been on probation and a third will have served a sentence at a local jail or juvenile facility.

• The lifetime likelihood of incarceration for African Americans (16.2%) is almost twice that of Hispanics (9.4%) and more than six times that of whites (2.5%).  Among men, African Americans have a 28.5% chance of incarceration over their lifetime, while Hispanics have a 16.2% chance and whites have a 4.4% chance.  Among women, African Americans have a 3.6 % chance of incarceration over their lifetimes while Hispanics have a 1.5% chance and whites have a 0.5% chance.

• The chance of going to prison for the first time declines with age.  Except for African American and Hispanic males, persons who reach age 45 without having been sentenced to prison have less than a 1% chance of going to prison for the rest of their lives.  For African American men, the estimated chance of going to prison for the first time after age 45 is 2.1% and for Hispanics, 3.0%.

 

Source: Sourcebook of Criminal Justice, http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/1995/pdf/t521.pdf

Sentencing

• 1996 was the first year that state and federal courts convicted a combined total of over one million adults on felony charges.  Sixty-nine percent of all convicted felons in 1996 were sentenced to incarceration in a jail or prison.  Felons sentenced to a state prison in 1996 had an average sentence of 5 years but were likely to serve almost a half (45%) of that sentence — or just over 2 years — before release. 

• In 2000, African American inmates spent an average of 7 years in federal prisons.  That is over three years longer than non-Hispanic whites (3.8 years) and Hispanics (3.6 years). African Americans served longer sentences than whites for all crimes except property offenses, where whites served 2.2 more months than African Americans in 2000. 

• For violent offenses in 2000 Africans Americans served about two years longer (8.6 years) than both whites (7 years) and Hispanics (6.3 years).  For drug offenses, African Americans served over almost four years longer (8.7 years) than Hispanics (4.9 years) and over three years longer than whites (5.0 years).

 

References

Bonczar, Thomas P., and Allen J. Beck. Lifetime Likelihood of Going to State or Federal Prison. Bureau of Justice Statistics, March 1997.  http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/ascii/llgsfp.txt

Durose, Matthew and P. Langan. Felony Sentences in State Courts: 2000. Bureau of Justice Statistics, June 2003.  www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/ascii/fssc00.txt
 
Rennison, Callie Marie. Criminal Victimization 2002.  U.S. Department of Justice: Aug. 2003. http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/ascii/cv00.txt
 
Rennison, Callie Marie. Criminal Victimization 2001, Changes 1997 98 with Trends 1993 98. U.S. Department of Justice: 31 Aug. 1999. http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/ascii/cv98.txt
 
U.S. Department of Justice (USDJ), Bureau of Justice Statistics. Corrections Statistics. http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/correct.htm
 
USDJ, Bureau of Justice Statistics. Corrections Statistics, U.S. Prison Population Rises 2.6 Percent During 2002. http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/press/p02pr.htm

Prepared by Cassandra Cantave and Roderick Harrison for the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. Updated August 2003.

Printer Friendly Version