Citizens Against Recidivism, Inc.
Stopping the revolving door . . . .
Neither imprisonment or the life after should mean the loss of all the rights and attributes of citizenship.
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Citizens Against Recidivism, Inc. Stopping the revolving door . . . . Neither imprisonment or the life after should mean the loss of all the rights and attributes of citizenship.
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Photos from First Annual Citizens Awards
Characteristics of people on parole in NY State - 2007 Policy Recommendation to increase higher education Opportunities for people in prison
Fact Sheet on Muslims in NYS prisons
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THE HUB SYSTEM: PROFILE OF POPULATION UNDER CUSTODY ON JANUARY 1, 2007*
In 1992, the New York State Department of Correctional Services reorganized the delivery of program services to its incarcerated population. One of the components of that plan included grouping the correctional facilities by geographical proximity into administrative regions. These regions include:
The characteristics of the people incarcerated in the State of New York are summarized below. The table that follows also includes comparisons across these regions.
Gender Distribution There were 63,304 people under custody on January 1, 2007, of whom 60,445 (95.5were men and 2,859 (4.5%) were women. Between January 2006 and January 2007, the numer of people incarcerated in New York State prisons increased by 572 or 0.9 percent. The percent of males incarcerated inmates increased by 575, an increase of 0.9 percent of the male population, while females incarcerated increased by 57 or 2.0 percent of the female population.
Age Distribution The average age of people under the custody of the News York State Department of Corrections was 36 years. The largest cohort of people in prison were between the ages of 25 and 29 years old (10,813; 17.1%). The second largest age cohort were between the ages of 35 and 39 years old (9,755; 15.4%). Youth 16 to 18 years old, constituted 1.2% (N = 755) of the total under custody population as of January 1, 2007. Seniors sixty years old or older constituted 2.5% (N= 1,572) of the people under custody in 2007, more than doubling the 1.2% of those 60 and older in custody in January 2000.
Race/Ethnic Distribution Over half (51.1%) of the people in prison were African-American, about a quarter were Hispanic (26.3%) and about one-fifth White (20.5%).
Region of Commitment The majority of people in New York State prisons (53.5%) were committed from New York City (New York City is comprised of Kings, New York, Queens, Richmond and Bronx counties). An additional 11.1% were committed from suburban New York (Nassau, Rockland, Suffolk, and Westchester counties, 20.6% from upstate counties with a population center containing 50,000 inhabitants or more (Albany, Broome, Erie, Monroe, Oneida, Onondaga, Niagara, Rensselaer, and Schenectady counties), and 14.7% from the remaining upstate counties.
Country of Birth Eighty-nine percent (88.8%) of the people under custody were born in the United States or a United States Territory, including American Samoa, Panama Canal Zone, Guam, U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. Approximately eleven percent (10.7%, N = 6,796) of those under custody were born in a foreign country. Most of those in custody who were born in a foreign country were from one of the island nations in the Caribbean basin (N = 3,746 or 5.9% of those under custody).
Marital Status About one-fifth (20.5%) of those under custody were legally married at the time of commitment. Another 3.4% were living in a common law arrangement at the time of their commitment. The majority were single, never married (65.4%); the balance were separated/divorced (8.7%) or widowed (1.0%).
Number of Living Children The majority of people under custody (59.2%) were parents and had at least one living child. Approximately 11% of the those under custody reported four or more living children.
Religious Affiliation Eighty-six percent (85.9%) of people under custody claimed affiliation with a recognized religion. The majority were Christians - almost twenty-seven percent (26.7%) were Catholic and thirty percent (30.1%) were Protestant. Thirteen percent (13.2%) were affiliated with the Islamic faith (does not include 3.9% or 2,483 affiliated with the Nation of Islam) and sixteen percent (16.0%) with other religions (Jews, Rastafarians, Native Americans, Asians religions Nation of Islam, and others). Fourteen percent (14.1%) either did not claim affiliation with a religion or did not provide information about religious affiliation.[1]
Veteran Status Of the 63,304 people under custody on January 1, 2007, about five (5.4%) were veterans: 163 (0.3%) were Pre Vietnam Era veterans, 868 (1.4%) were Vietnam Era, 1,600 (2.5%) are Post Vietnam Era, 535 (0.8%) are Persian Gulf I Era, 100 (0.2%) were Afghanistan/Iraq Era; and 130 (0.2%) were veterans of the armed forces where service era dates were not recorded on DOCS computer files.
Minimum Sentence The median minimum sentence of under custody inmates was 60.0 months[2]. However, the average minimum sentence length was 106.1 months (almost nine years), reflecting the influence of lengthy minimum sentences received by many of those who are currently incarcerated. The median minimum sentence for persons in maximum-security facilities was 144 months; for those in medium security facilities it was 46 months. For those in minimum-security facilities the median minimum term was 26 months. As of January 1, 2007, there were 171 people under custody who were serving sentences of "Life Without Parole" and one person serving a death penalty sentence.
Commitment Crime Fifty-seven percent of people under custody on January 1, 2007, had been convicted of violent felony crimes (17.1% for a class of robbery and 12.2% for murder). Another 7.6% were convicted of other coercive offenses, 22.0% were convicted of drug offenses, and 11.1% for property and other crime. There were 932 people (1.5%) under custody who had been sentenced as a Youthful Offender, and 236 (0.4%) who were sentenced as a Juvenile Offender.
Second Felony Offender Status Over half (52.2%) of people under custody on January 1, 2007 were sentenced as first felony offenders, 43.8% were sentenced as second felony offenders, and 4.0% were sentenced as persistent felony offenders.
Prior Adult Criminal Record Thirty-five percent (34.9%) of under custody inmates had served a prior prison term. For 24.2%, prior jail was the most serious contact with the criminal justice system. Nineteen percent (18.9%) had a prior adult criminal conviction, which did not result in jail or prison incarceration, while 7.5% had no prior conviction and 14.5% had no prior arrest.
Length of Time Served at Current Holding Facility The average length of time served at the current correctional facility for a person under custody on January 1, 2007, was 16.6 months and the median was 7.6 months.[3]
Length of Time in Department Custody People held under custody on January 1, 2007, had spent on average 53.9 months in DOCS since their latest admission date. The median length of time was 24.8 months. DOCS data show that 15,529 (24.5%) of currently in prison had spent 72 months (6 years) or more under custody and 6,210 (9.8%) had spent less than 3 months under custody.
Time to Earliest Release Eligibility Time to earliest release date is a measure of the length of time until the earliest possible date at which the a person in custody can be legally released. People in custody are not necessarily released on this date. The NYS Board of Parole may require the people in prison to remain in prison beyond the earliest legal release date or the incarcerated person may lose good time due to poor discipline or refusal to program and thus remain in prison longer as a result of that behavior. The "average time to earliest release" for the total under custody population on January 1, 2007 was 45.7 months (nearly 4 years), and the "median time to earliest release" was 13.6 months.
Reading Proficiency The NYS Department of Corrections's education program objective is to encourage every incarcerated person to pass a high school equivalency General Education Diploma (GED) test while in prison. By Department Directive, people in prison who do not read on a 9th grade reading level are required to be placed in educational programming until reading levels are tested at the 9th grade.
In sum, people in prison with reading levels in the 0 - 5th grade range require adult basic education (ABE) courses. Those in the 6 - 8 grade range require course work to improve their test scores before being eligible for the GED examinations, while those in the 9 - 12th grade category are eligible to take the GED examinations, so their course work helps them prepare for the GED exam. People in prison must score at the ninth grade level or above in both reading and math before being eligible to take the GED exam.
Of the 63,473 people under custody on February 17, 2007, 33,496 (52.8%) had a verified GED, high school diploma or higher degree, and 29,977 (47.2%) were without verified academic degrees. In all, 12,184 inmates (19.2%) whose reading ability was below the sixth grade level, and an additional 8,897 (14.0%) whose reading ability was between the 6th grade and 8th grade level, were not eligible to take a GED exam. Additional services were required for those reading at these grade levels in order to qualify to take a GED exam.
English Language Proficiency The vast majority (91.9%) of the people under custody are English language dominant. There were also 4,148 (6.6%) people in prison who were Spanish language dominant (which includes Spanish dominant only, Spanish and limited English, and Spanish and moderate English).
Substance Abuse NYS Department of Corrections data show that 71.7% of those under custody in January 2007 abuse drugs, alcohol, or both as measured by available data from tests and self-reporting. For those for whom test results were available 23.9% (N=13,744) were defined as alcoholic and another 13.4% (N=7,670) were possibly alcoholic.
_____________________________________________ [1] Note, these figure relate to last recorded religious affiliation. Often people in prison change faiths and fail to record those changes with the authorities. [2] The median is a measure of central tendency which represents the value of the middle case (i.e. the case or cases at the 50th percentile) in the distribution of cases. The median is less subject to the influence of extreme values than is the arithmetic average and is preferred by some users for this reason. [3] Information on length of time served at current holding facility is useful to facility staff when planning program assignments. Staff use this information to help design assignments that minimize the risk of disruption to a program plan due to transfer or release. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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