NCJ Number
198001
Journal
Prison Journal Volume: 82 Issue: 4 Dated: December 2002 Pages: 498-525
Date Published
December 2002
Length
28 pages
Annotation
This study examined the process of achieving racial integration in the Texas prison system, with attention to the court's role in forcing racial integration, the organizational response to integration, the unit-level process of integration, and the general impact of an integration policy in Texas prisons.
Abstract
The study drew heavily from three sources of data: court and prison system documents, observation at several prison units from January 2000 through October 2000, and 10 years of inmate-on-inmate assault data collected by the Texas prison system. The latter data were used to examine the extent of interracial inmate-on-inmate violence in the aftermath of the racial integration of cells over the long term. Texas was forced to racially integrate two-person cells through a massive class action civil suit. The Texas prison system has integrated nearly 70 percent of two-person cells following compliance with the court in 1991. Integration is systemwide and has involved more inmates than are held in most States' entire correctional systems. Significantly, Texas integration extends to the cell level, not only to large areas of the prison. The Texas' experience indicates that integration is not only a policy that can be achieved, but it has been at least as successful as segregation in the management of institutional violence, perhaps even more so in fostering inmate-to-inmate relations. Based on official data since 1990, intraracial assaults in the Texas prison system have always held a higher rate than interracial assaults. This trend held true even after 1993, when there were more integrated cells than nonintegrated cells. Suggestions are offered for issues that require further study. 3 tables, 1 figure, 15 notes, 64 references, and appended list of leading cases on racial integration in prisons