NCJ Number
128404
Date Published
1989
Length
30 pages
Annotation
During the last decade, the problem of jail overcrowding has reached crisis proportions in many jurisdictions with 27 percent of the nation's jails with a capacity of 100 or more inmates in 1986 under Federal or State caps on the number of pretrial detainees and sentenced prisoners they could house.
Abstract
The intensity of the jail population crisis is a product of many factors: increasing jail population, overburdened and underfunded court systems that cannot keep pace with the increasing pretrial and trial workload, conservative policies regarding pretrial release, traditional sentencing philosophies that rely significantly on incarceration, and overcrowded State correctional facilities that are not able to accommodate sentenced offenders. Jurisdictions should establish a jail capacity management program that incorporates a board, competent staff, formal action plan, detailed system flow chart, and reliable data base. Steps involved in implementing a jail capacity management program are detailed as well as the role of law enforcement, prosecution, indigent defense services, pretrial release services, courts, and corrections in the program. A sample performance report is provided for evaluating jail capacity management. 45 references