Prison Overcrowing

The National Prison Overcrowding Project, operated by the center for effective public policy, began in 1981 out of the desire of the National Institute of Corrections and the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation to launch abroad systemic approach to controlling prison overcrowding in the States. The center has guided the development and operation of a policy group in each of the States. There are only two basic options for reducing prison populations one is front-door options that send fewer people to prison and for shorter periods and back-door options that lets inmates out sooner that under previous policies.(Michael Tonry 2003) Front-door strategies include repealing mandatory minimum sentencing laws; reducing the number of offenses for which incarceration is a sentencing option; establishing presumptive sentencing guidelines that are premised on the policy on the policy that lengths of all prison sentences should be reduce by an assigned percentage; the reduction of guidelines judgments starting points of all crimes by some percentage.

Other front-door options are to discourage the imposition of prison sentences of 6 months or less; creating a new sentence of intermittent conferment; create a new sentence of intermittent confinement, create and promote new diversion programs prohibit prison admissions when the inmate population exceeds 95 percent of capacity; all drug dependent offenders into drug treatment programs.  Back-door policies include the implementation of a large scale amnesty for inmates convicted of nonviolent offenses; reestablish a broad based parole release system; set an absolute prison capacity limit; authorize petitioning for the resentencing of inmates, give the prison service the discretion to release inmates in community programs on a case by case basis; also provide early release into intensive community supervision programs.

Prison overcrowding is a grave and pressing problem facing the Criminal Justice Administration in many countries it has reached critical levels. In this regard it would be of interest to know how countries measure prison overcrowding. I there a common criteria as to what is the required accommodation or floor area or other conditions per prisoner? (Hetti G Dharmadasa) The Unites Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the treatment of prisoners stipulate certain standards in this regard. Using an example rule 10 stipulates that all accommodation provided for the use of prisoners and in particular all sleeping accommodation shall meet all requirements of health, due regard be paid to climate conditions and particularly to cubic content of air, minimum floor space, lighting , heating and ventilation.

Overcrowding of prisoners in some of the States is not merely a numerical or spatial problem. It is a problem of gross inadequacy of essential facilities such as sanitary and bathing installations, medical and recreational facilities. In this country and other countries prison overcrowding can be more than a problem it can be a crisis. Prison populations are determined by policy choices, and there are three general policy options; expansion, which is committed to the belief that an expanded prison system will benefit society; standstill which aims at holding prison populations steady; and reduction, which aims at reducing the use of prison. Standstill policy is unlikely to be an effective counter to expansionist pressures; as the custodial threshold is lowered to include persons who earlier would have been fined or dealt with by noncustodial means.(A Rutherford 1984)Expansion policy is very costly ineffective in dealing with crime and demeaning to the society that embraces it. Reduction aims at limiting imprisonment to serious offenders, it promises to be effective only if prison populations are first limited, by the development of an array of noncustodial options for less serious offenders.