Corrections in America

Chapter 9
Michelle Alexander (please watch)
Michelle Alexander is a very well-known, highly regarded scholar on
race, mass incarceration and social control. Everybody who is
learning about race and corrections in the United States should be
familiar with her work. Please know, however, that in this particular
presentation, she is not very precise at times in her use of language.
For example, she references “police,” which could be understood as
all police, when referencing a particular police crew/unit. Please do
not let this detract from the factual, experiential and legal basis upon
which she makes her arguments. Like all videos, it is intended to be
educational and not an endorsement of any political ideology or
personal opinion.
 Correctional Statistics
• For the slides that present charts and graphs, please note the
patterns. You do not need to memorize each number or statistic;
you need to understand the general patterns, as well as the
importance and significance of those patterns.
• Also, note that some graphs present total numbers while others
present rates. Rates take into account representation within the
general population (e.g., 2,207 black persons incarcerated per
100,000 black persons in the general U.S. population)
• I include statistics on Wisconsin for two reasons: (1) FYI since you
live in WI and (2) to stress the contextual variation. Remember that
most statistics are aggregated at national level (U.S. as a whole).
When you disaggregate these statistics, you find substantial
contextual variation (e.g., state level). The more we disaggregate,
the clearer the contextual variation (e.g., community level).
 Correctional Statistics

• In 2019, there were 1.8 M inmates (fed, state and

local jails and prisons)
• Every year, over 600,000 people enter prison gates,
but people go to jail 10.6 million times each year
• 1 in 37 Americans under US Corrections custody
(probation, parole, prison, jail)
• 1 in 3 Americans have some type of criminal record
– FBI - 30% of people have criminal records (those
who have been arrested for a felony)
 Correctional Statistics
http://www.sentencingproject.org/template/page.cfm?id=122

• 1 in 3 AA males have a lifetime likelihood

of incarceration
– 1 in 6 Latino men
– 1 in 17 W men
• 1 in 18 AA females have a lifetime
likelihood of incarceration
– 1 in 45 Latino women
– 1 in 111 W women
 Correctional Statistics
http://www.naacp.org/pages/criminal-justice-fact-sheet

• Nationwide, African-Americans represent

26% of juvenile arrests, 44% of youth who
are detained, 46% of the youth who are
judicially waived to criminal court, and
58% of the youth admitted to state prisons
(Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice).
 What Explains Minority
Overrepresentation?
• Differential Offending
• W – relatively more likely to commit and
be convicted of federal offenses
• AA – more likely to be arrested and
convicted for index crimes, which are
generally state offenses
• H – consistently overrepresented among
convicted drug offenders at federal level
and among immigration law offenders
 Race, Ethnicity and Recidivism
• Recidivism
• 4 Measurements
• 1. re-arrest for new crime (felony or
misdemeanor)
• 2. reconviction (state or federal court)
• 3. re-sentence to prison
• 4. revocation of parole (technical or new
offense violation)
 Race, Ethnicity and Recidivism
• A study of recidivism in 15 states found:
• Compared to W, AA more likely to be:
– rearrested (72.9% compared to 62.7%)
– reconvicted (51.1% compared to 43.3%)
– re-sentenced (28.5% compared to 22.6%)
– revoked (54.2% compared to 51.9%)
 Race, Ethnicity and Recidivism
• A study of recidivism in 15 states found:
• Compared to Non-H, H more likely to be:
– rearrested (71.4% compared to 64.6%)
– reconvicted (50.7% compared to 43.9%)
– revoked (57.3% compared to 51.9%)
– No differences regarding the likelihood of
being re-sentenced
 What Explains Minority
Overrepresentation?
• While differential involvement in crime can explain some
of the racial/ethnic minority overrepresentation,
• Differential enforcement of the law also explains some of
the racial/ethnic minority overrepresentation
– Particularly with respect to
Enforcement practices of the “War on Drugs”
• War on Heroin
• War on Drugs (crack cocaine)
• Race, Class, Politics, War on Drugs and Mass Incarcer
ation
• The Wire creator David Simon’s take on the War on Dr
ugs
 War on Drugs
(Alexander, 2011 – The New Jim Crow)

• War on Drugs – 1980s

– Between 1980 and 1984, FBI anti-drug funding increased
from $8M to $95M.
– Dept. of Defense antidrug allocations increased from $33M in
1981 to $1,042M in 1991
– During the same time, DEA antidrug spending grew from
$86M to $1,026M.
– Drug prevention and treatment agencies’ budgets were
dramatically reduced
• National Institute on Drug Abuse: $274M to $57M from
1981-1984
• More money on enforcement and less on prevention and
treatment
 War on Drugs
http://www.thehouseilivein.org/get-involved/drug-war-today/

• Over the past 40 years, the War on Drugs

has cost more than $1 trillion and
accounted for more than 45 million arrests.
• In 2009 nearly 1.7 million people were
arrested in the U.S. for nonviolent drug
charges – more than half of those arrests
were for marijuana possession alone. Less
than 20% was for the sale or manufacture
of a drug.
 War on Drugs
http://www.thehouseilivein.org/get-involved/drug-war-today/
http://www.naacp.org/pages/criminal-justice-fact-sheet

• African Americans represent 12% of the

total population of drug users, but 38% of
those arrested for drug offenses, and 59%
of those in state prison for a drug offense
• Even though White and Black people use
drugs at approximately equal rates, Black
people are 10.1 times more likely to be
sent to prison for drug offenses.
 War on Drugs
http://www.thehouseilivein.org/get-involved/drug-war-today/

• Between 1973 and 2009, the nation’s

prison population grew by 705 percent,
resulting in more than 1 in 100 adults
behind bars today. In 1980, the total U.S.
prison and jail population was about
500,000 – today, it is more than 1.5
million.
 War on Drugs
• Impact?
– More AA and H arrested
– More AA and H in prison
– Social stigma
– Loss of benefits
– Reentry issues
– Limited/no job opportunities
– Deleterious impact on neighborhoods
– No male role models
• Increase in gang participation
– AND SO ON…
• John Oliver on Prisoner Reentry
 The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in
the Age of Colorblindness (Alexander, 2011)
• Alexander describes how mass incarceration
today serves the same purpose as pre-Civil War
slavery and the post-Civil War Jim Crow laws: to
maintain a racial caste system. Alexander
defines “racial caste” as a racial group locked
into an inferior position by law and custom. She
asserts that Jim Crow and slavery were caste
systems, and that our current system of mass
incarceration is also a caste system: “The New
Jim Crow.”
 Jails and Minorities
http://www.sentencingproject.org/template/page.cfm?id=122

• Just over 60% of jail inmates are awaiting trial

• Daily pop of jails is lower than prison, but the
annual total is higher
• Every year, over 600,000 people enter prison
gates, but people go to jail 10.6 million times
each year
• For AA males in their 30s, 1 in every 10 is in
prison or jail on any given day
 Community Corrections
• About 6.7M persons are
under correctional
supervision
– 4.5M supervised in the
community on parole or
probation (2018)
• 1 in 55 people are under
community supervision
(2018)
 Probation
• Over 4M persons are on probation
• Petersilia found in CA that:
– 71% of W convicted of a felony were granted
probation
– 67% of AA and 65% H
• Spohn found that in “borderline cases,” W
were more likely to get probation and AA
were more likely to get prison
 Adjustment to Prison
• Racial and ethnic segregation in prison mirrors society
• Mixed research on prison acclimation
– Some shows race as an issue; others do not
• Major Issue – Race of Prison Guards
– Federal prison correctional officers (2021)
• 62% W, 21% B, 13% H, 2% A
– State prison correctional officers (2021)
• 62% W, 20% B, 14% H, 2% A
• Surviving prison (article)
• Surviving prison (article written by an inmate)
 Racial Geography of Mass Incarceration
• Stark racial and ethnic disparities exist between incarcerated people
and the people in the county outside the prison's walls.
• Blacks are more likely to be locked up in communities very different
than their homes in states such as Michigan or Wisconsin
• Blacks are incarcerated at a rate about 5 times higher than whites,
but prisons are disproportionately located in majority-white areas.
– This combination has tremendous implications for the prison
system’s ability to hire appropriate numbers of Black staff.
• Hundreds of counties have a 10-to-1 “ratio of over-representation”
between incarcerated Blacks and Blacks in the surrounding county —
meaning that the portion of the prison that is Black is at least 10 times
larger than the portion of the surrounding county that is Black.
 Mortality in Prisons and Jails
• 149/100,000 inmates die in jails per year (2016)
– Suicide remained the leading cause of death in local
jails in 2016, accounting for nearly a third of jail
deaths (31%).
– About 40% of inmate deaths in 2016 occurred within
the first 7 days of admission to jail.
• 303/100,000 inmates die in state prisons (2016)
– Illness-related deaths made up 86% of deaths in state
prisons in 2016
• 252/100,000 inmates die in federal prisons (2016)
– Illness-related deaths made up 91% of death in
federal prisons in 2016
 Post-Incarceration Syndrome
• The Post-Incarceration Syndrome (PICS) is a mixed mental disorders with
five clusters of symptoms:
• (1) Institutionalized Personality Traits resulting from the common
deprivations of incarceration, a chronic state of learned helplessness in the
face of prison authorities, and antisocial defenses in dealing with a predatory
inmate milieu,
• (2) Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) from both pre-incarceration
trauma and trauma experienced within the institution,
• (3) Antisocial Personality Traits (ASPT) developed as a coping response to
institutional abuse and a predatory prisoner milieu,
• (4) Social-Sensory Deprivation Syndrome caused by prolonged exposure to
solitary confinement that radically restricts social contact and sensory
stimulation, and
• (5) Substance Use Disorders caused by the use of alcohol and other drugs
to manage or escape the PICS symptoms.
 Post-Incarceration Syndrome
• The syndrome is most severe in prisoners incarcerated
for longer than one year in a punishment-oriented
environment, who have experienced multiple episodes of
institutional abuse, who have had little or no access to
education, vocational training, or rehabilitation, who have
been subjected to 30 days or longer in solitary
confinement, and who have experienced frequent and
severe episodes of trauma as a result of institutional
abuse.
• Post-incarceration syndrome
 Prison Penalty
• “The stigma that surrounds a former convict follows like a cloud
of judgment and negativity wherever they go. That stigma
places a barrier to accessing affordable housing, securing a job
and moving on with their life once released. This results in high
recidivism rates.”(https://www.mockingbirdsociety.org/mockingbird-times-may-2016/156-
the-stigma-of-prison)
• “Formerly incarcerated people are almost five times more likely
than the general public to be unemployed, and many who are
employed remain relegated to the most insecure jobs. Our
analysis also shows that formerly incarcerated people of color
and women face the worst labor market disadvantages despite
being more likely to be looking for jobs.”
(https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/outofwork.html)
 Prison Penalty
• The transition from prison back to the community is fraught
with challenges; the search for employment is one of many
tasks that can derail successful reentry. In the period
immediately following release, formerly incarcerated people
are likely to struggle to find housing and attain addiction and
mental health support. They also face disproportionately high
rates of death due to drug overdose, cardiovascular disease,
homicide, and suicide within this crucial period.
(https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/outofwork.html)
 Felony Disenfranchisement
• As of 2016, 6.1 million Americans were unable to vote due to state felony
disenfranchisement policies
• In 48 states, a felony conviction can result in the loss of an individual’s
voting rights.
• An estimated 5.85 million Americans, or one in forty adults, have
currently or permanently lost their voting rights as a result of a felony
conviction.
• 2.2 million African Americans, or 7.7% of black adults, are
disenfranchised, compared to 1.8% of the non-African American
population. In three states – Florida (23%), Kentucky (22%), and
Virginia (20%) – more than one in five African Americans is
disenfranchised.
• 2.6 million disenfranchised persons have completed their sentences,
comprising 45% of the total disenfranchised population.
 Conclusions
• African Americans are overrepresented in prison
populations
• War on Drugs significantly contributed to mass
incarceration of African Americans
– Contextual discrimination
• Mass incarceration produces a racial caste system
(Alexander, 2011 – see next slide for excerpt regarding
“racial caste system”)
– Michelle Alexander argues that America’s racial caste
system didn’t disappear; it’s just been redesigned as
the criminal-justice system.
 What Alexander Means by “Racial Caste System”
http://www.cflj.org/programs/new-jim-crow/

“Alexander defines “racial caste” as a racial group locked into an inferior position by
law and custom. She asserts that Jim Crow and slavery were caste systems, and
that our current system of mass incarceration is also a caste system: “The New Jim
Crow.” The original Jim Crow laws, after slavery ended, promoted racial
discrimination in public housing, employment, voting, and education. The powerful
Civil Rights struggles of the 1950s and 1960s seemingly ended the Jim Crow era by
winning the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of
1965. Her research demonstrates, however, that the racial caste system has not
ended; it has simply been redesigned. Alexander explains how the criminal justice
system functions as a new system of racial control by targeting black men through
the “War on Drugs.” The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, for example, included far
more severe punishment for distribution of crack (associated with blacks) than
powder cocaine (associated with whites). Civil penalties, such as not being able
to live in public housing and not being able to get student loans, have been
added to the already harsh prison sentences. “Today,” says Alexander, “a
criminal freed from prison has scarcely more rights, and arguably less
respect, than a freed slave or a black person living ‘free’ in Mississippi at the
height of Jim Crow.” The author argues that nothing short of a major social
movement can end the new caste system.”
 Conclusions
• Criminal justice enforcement patterns, in general, are
contextual and impact geographic contexts differently
(contextual variation)
• These enforcement efforts have had deleterious
effects on communities
• The same social structural factors that explain
differential offending also explains, in part, differential
enforcement/treatment under the law
– Race SES Pretrial Detention Plea Bargaining
– Race SES Pretrial Detention Sentencing Prison
 MILWAUKEE VIDEO
• Milwaukee 53206: A Community Serves
Time Video
• I am not requiring you to watch this video;
however, I am recommending that you
watch this video.
• The video brings all the material home
(Milwaukee) and presents a picture of how
CJ practices are impacted by communities
AND the impact CJ practices have on
communities