Prison Overcroweded

Overcrowded Prison In The State Of California

The state of California has the highest incarceration rate in the world, 626 out of every 100,000 Californians are incarcerated. In 1977, California housed 19,600 inmates. A decade later in 1998, the inmate population had skyrocketed by an astronomical 811 percent to 159,000. By February 2000 that number had jumped to 161,000. It houses more prisoners than do the countries of France, Germany, the Netherlands, and Singapore combined. California has spent $5.2 billion on new prisons since 1977, yet it still has the most overcrowded system in the United States. Currently, the state of California incarcerates one out of every eight prisoners in the United States. It is estimated that California will eventually need 30 to 50 new prisons to accommodate

the influx of prisoners dictated by mandatory sentencing, stiffer enforcement of parole violations, and the three-strikes law.

The biggest minorities in Californian prison are Latinos then Blacks. A lot of the charges that imprison people in California are non-violent crimes. You would like to think a lot people are being sent for murder, rap and kidnapping. Most of the crimes are possession of a controlled substance, possession of ac controlled substance for sale, robbery, sales of a controlled substance, second degree burglary, assault with a deadly weapon, driving under the influence, first degree burglary, petty theft with a prior, vehicle theft . In fact, more often people are being sent to prison now for charges such as forgery, fraud and theft than for charges such as rape or murder.

Actually California spends more money on prisons then it does education. Researchers found that California spends 4.3 billion on education and 5.6 billion on prisons. That doesn't include psychiatric wards or city jails, police officers or the courts. People in California are not