Allen J. Beck, Ph.D., Paige M. Harrison, Bureau of Justice Statistics

June 25, 2008    NCJ 221946

Presents data from the 2007 National Inmate Survey (NIS), conducted in 282 local jails between April and December, with a sample of 40,419 inmates. The report and appendix tables provide a listing of results for sampled local jails, as required under the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (P.L. 108-79). Facilities are listed alphabetically by state with estimated prevalence rates of sexual victimization as reported by inmates during a personal interview and based on activity in the 6 months prior to the interview or since admission to the facility, if shorter. The report includes national-level and facility-level estimates of nonconsensual sexual acts, abusive sexual contacts, inmate-on-inmate and staff-on-inmate victimization, and level of coercion. It also includes estimates of the standard error for selected measures of sexual victimization and summary characteristics of victims and incidents. Data collected from prison inmates in the National Inmate Survey were reported in Sexual Victimization in State and Federal Prisons Reported by Inmates, 2007, released in December 2007.

Highlights:

• About 1.6% of inmates (12,100, nationwide) reported an incident involving another inmate, and 2.0% (15,200) reported an incident involving staff.
• Inmate-on-inmate victimization occurred most often in the victims cell (56%); staff-on-inmate victimization occurred in a closet, office, or other locked room (47%).
• An estimated 5.1% of female inmates, compared to 2.9% of male inmates, said they had experienced one or more incidents of sexual victimization.

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