ABSTRACT
At the beginning of January, 2008, federal and state governments held 1,598,316 prisoners under their jurisdictions (West & Sabol, 2008). Six months earlier, Sabol and Minton (2008) reported that 780,581 detainees were held in local jails. The Bureau of Justice Statistics (2009) reported that as of June 30, 2008 federal and state correctional systems had custody of 1,610,584 prisoners. Within these prisons and jails, African American males were incarcerated at 6.6 times the rate for White males (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2009). Put in another manner, 1 in 21 African American males were in prisons and jails compared to 1 in 138 White males (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2009). More simply, on June 30, 2008, 846,000 African American males were in prisons and jails, 712,500 White males, and 427,000 Latino males (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2009). Among females, the rates and numbers were lower, but racial differences exist. Among African American females, their rate of incarceration was 349 per 100,000 compared to 93 per 100,000 for White females and 147 per 100,000 for Latino females (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2009). Combined, 207,700 women were incarcerated as of midyear 2008 (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2009).
