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Over the past three decades, the number of people housed in local jails has more than tripled. Yet when it comes to reforming the nation's incarceration policies, write Jennifer Copp and William Bales, researchers, policymakers, and the public alike have focused almost exclusively on state and federal prisons. If you took a snapshot on a single day, the prison population would far exceed the population of local jails. But, the authors show, compared to prisons, roughly 18 times more people are admitted to and released from jails every year. Furthermore, about two-thirds of jail inmates have yet to be convicted of a crime, and they often languish behind bars only because they can't afford to pay bail. And although jails are intended for adults, on any given day roughly 4,000 young people under age 18 are confined in local jails. In this article, Copp and Bales provide a broad overview of US jails, including facilities and operations, characteristics of inmates, and the conditions of confinement, and they make a number of suggestions for policy and practice. In particular, they argue that the justice system should slash the use of money bail, which disproportionately harms the poor and minorities. Specifically, they recommend that jurisdictions adopt validated risk assessment tools to help make decisions about who should and shouldn't be detained before trial; expand pretrial services that can, among other things, monitor compliance with release conditions; divert more people away from the criminal justice system; consider alternatives to jail, such as probation, for convicted offenders; and expedite case processing to decrease the time to trial and thus the overall length of jail stays.

Solitary confinement may affect incarcerated persons. Yet, what is known about those who work in solitary confinement units? Drawing on Sykes' classic, The society of captives, on the "pains of imprisonment," we argue that solitary confinement work may adversely affect correctional personnel. This study extends prior work on deprivation theory, solitary confinement, and research on work in prison by testing this argument through analyses of qualitative data. We find that those who work in solitary confinement units report deprivations analogous to what incarcerated persons experience. The article concludes with a call for expanding theoretical and empirical research on solitary confinement and the impacts of contemporary penal practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research has linked the role of education to delinquency, but much of the focus has been on general population samples and with little attention to demographic differences. Employing a cumulative disadvantage framework that integrates elements of informal social control and labeling theories, this article examines whether academic achievement serves as a positive turning point and re-directs juvenile delinquents away from subsequent offending. Attention is also given to race/sex contingencies. Using a sample of 4,147 delinquents released from Florida correctional institutions (86% male, 57% non-White, average age at release = 16.8 years), propensity score analysis yielded two findings: youth with above average academic achievement while incarcerated were significantly more likely to return to school post-release, and youth with above average attendance in public school were significantly less likely to be re-arrested in the 1-year post-release period. While the academic gains were pronounced among African-American males, the preventive effects of school attendance are similar across race and sex, suggesting that education can be a part of a larger prevention effort that assists juvenile delinquents in successful community re-entry.

Despite increased scholarly and policy attention to prisoner reentry, much remains unknown about the factors that contribute to a successful transition from prison to society. The authors focused on a neglected but potentially critical factor, inmate visitation, that may reduce recidivism. The expectation of such an effect stems from prominent crime theories and an increasing body of work that stresses the importance of social ties to the reentry process. Using data from the Florida Department of Corrections, the authors tested hypotheses about the effects of visitation on recidivism. The measures of visitation included whether any visits occurred, the frequency and recency of visitation, and the type of visitor received (e.g., family member, friend). The authors also examined whether visitation effects varied by age, sex, race, type of instant offense, and prior incarceration. The findings indicate that visitation reduces and delays recidivism. Their implications for theory, research, and policy are discussed. Keywords: prisoner; visitation; recidivism

There is a large body of research that examines the impact of visitation on the likelihood of recidivism among released state prisoners. That research reveals that receiving any visits, and a greater number of visits, reduces the likelihood of recidivism. However, whether the recidivism-reducing effect of visitation operates within the jail setting remains unclear. Using data from a Florida jail, the current investigation examines the association between visitation and recidivism among a cohort of releases (N = 6,565). Analyses also consider the extent to which the frequency of visits impacts the likelihood of recidivism. Findings from a series of logistic regression models reveal that inmates who received visits were no less likely to recidivate than their counterparts. Yet, among inmates who were visited, those receiving more frequent visits were less likely to recidivate. This departs from existing visitation research and underscores the importance of directing research attention to local jails. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholarship suggests that prison inmates who are visited may be less likely to recidivate. Questions exist, however, about whether the observed relationship is causal and, if so, whether it is consistent for different groups of inmates. To address these questions, this study employs two methodological approaches – first, conventional regression analyses and, second, instrumental variable (IV) analyses – to examine the effects of visitation in general and specifically for females, young inmates, and individuals incarcerated for the first time. Effect size estimates are similar across the two analytic approaches, but conventional regression analyses identify a statistically significant effect of visitation, whereas IV analyses do not. Subgroup analyses suggest differences between males and females and by age. Combined, the results raise questions about whether visitation exerts a causal effect on offending. Implications for theory, research, and policy of the divergent results and the potential for a generalized visitation effect are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several studies have compared the criminal court sentences given to transferred juveniles with those given to adults, but this research has reported inconsistent findings. In addition, some research has found that mode of conviction can interact with offenders’ characteristics, resulting in stronger or weaker effects of these factors among defendants convicted at trials. The current study explores the direct effects of juvenile status on sentence severity and whether these effects are conditioned by mode of conviction. Examination of data from Florida circuit courts (N = 1,107,233) shows that transferred juveniles are less likely to be incarcerated than adults but are given longer incarceration sentences. Interaction analyses reveal that these disparities are weaker among trial cases than among plea cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on prior sentencing and prison scholarship, this study examines the use of solitary confinement as a form of punishment. Specifically, it assesses whether, given a prison infraction, minority inmates--and young, male, minority inmates in particular--are more likely to be placed in solitary and to be placed in it for longer durations. Multilevel regression analyses of state prison data suggest little support for the hypothesis that minority males, or young minority, males, are sanctioned more harshly than other inmates. The analyses identify, however, that males are more likely than females to be placed in solitary as a form of disciplinary punishment and that younger females are more likely to be placed in it than older females. The findings highlight that age and sex may interact to influence punishment decisions and raise questions about the precise roles of race and ethnicity in affecting punishment decisions. Implications of the findings for theory, research, and policy are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]