BJS: Bureau of Justice Statistics

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Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS)
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BJS collects data on the characteristics and movements of the federal prison population through the National Prisoner Statistics, the Federal Justice Statistics Program, and the Survey of Inmates in State and Federal Facilities. See Corrections Data Sources for more information. The federal prisoner population differs from prisoners held in jail or state correctional facilities most notably by offense conviction status, length of stay, and offense distribution. 

Note that jurisdiction and custody numbers for federal prisoners now include counts for sentenced felons from the District of Columbia. After 2001, responsibility for sentenced felons from the District of Columbia was transferred to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

Summary findings

Recent findings --

  • At midyear 2008, there were 201,142 prisoners under federal jurisdiction.
  • The federal prison population grew an average of 4.6% a year between 2000 and 2007, compared to 1.7% average annual growth for state prisoners.
  • Federal prisoners held in privately-operated facilities more than doubled from 15,524 at yearend 2000 to 32,712 at midyear 2008. About 16% of federal prisoners were held in private facilities by midyear 2008.
  • On June 30, 2008, 1.3% (2,575) of federal prisoners were held in local jails.

From Prisoners in 2007:

Appendix table 12. Number of sentenced prisoners in federal prison, by most serious offense, 2000, 2006, and 2007
    2000 2006 2007 Average annual change, 2000-2006 Percent change, 2006-2007
Offense            
  Total  131,739  176,268  179,204  5.0%  1.7%
Violent offenses    13,740  16,507  15,647  3.1  -5.2
  Homicide/a  1,363  2,923  2,915  13.6  -0.3
  Robbery  9,712  9,645  8,966  -0.1  -7.0
  Other violent  2,665  3,939  3,767  6.7  -4.4
Property offenses    10,135  10,015  10,345  -0.2  3.3
  Burglary  462  519  504  2.0  -2.9
  Fraud  7,506  6,437  7,834  -2.5  21.7
  Other property  2,167  3,059  2,006  5.9  -34.4
Drug offenses    74,276  93,751  95,446  4.0  1.8
Public order offenses    32,325  54,336  56,273  9.0  3.6
  Immigration  13,676  19,496  19,528  6.1  0.2
  Weapons  10,822  24,298  25,435  14.4  4.7
  Other  7,827  10,542  11,311  5.1  7.3
Other/unspecified/b    1,263  1,659  1,492  4.7  -10.0
Note: All data are from the BJS Federal Justice Statistics Program. Data are for September 30 and based on all sentenced inmates, regardless of sentence length.
a/Includes murder and negligent and nonnegligent manslaughter.
b/Includes offenses not classified.

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Federal prisons Prison facilities run by the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Prisoners housed in these facilities are under the legal authority of the federal government. This definition excludes the private facilities that are under exclusive contract with BOP.
 
Private prisons Prison facilities run by private prison corporations whose services and beds are contracted out by state governments or the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
 
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