Jails - Number Of Jail Inmates

People in jail represent the smallest percentage of individuals in custody. According to Paige M. Harrison and Jennifer C. Karberg in Prison and Jail Inmates at Midyear 2003 (Bureau of Justice Statistics, May 2004), on June 30, 2003, the nation's jails held or supervised 762,672 inmates, more than 90% of those (691,301 inmates) were behind bars and the rest (71,371 inmates) were supervised outside the jail in community service, work release, weekend reporting, electronic monitoring, and other alternative programs. The jail population was up 3.9% from the year before as reported in Prison and Jail Inmates at Midyear 2003. (See Table 3.1.) The increase was just below the average annual growth of 4% experienced between 1995 and 2003.

According to Harrison and Karberg, the jail inmate population rose from 193 per 100,000 U.S. residents in 1995 to 238 per 100,000 in 2003. (See Table 3.2.) The average daily jail population for 2003 was 680,760, an increase of 4.4% from 652,082 in 2002 and up 33.5% from 509,828 in 1995. (See Table 2.11 in Chapter 2.)

Significant changes have occurred in the profile of this population in the eight-year period shown in Table 2.11. Men represented the overwhelming majority of the TABLE 3.1
Number of persons held in state or federal prisons or in local jails, 1995–2003
SOURCE: Paige M. Harrison and Jennifer C. Karberg, "Table 1. Number of Persons Held in State or Federal Prisons or in Local Jails, 1995–2003," in Prison and Jail Inmates at Midyear 2003, Bureau of Justice Statistics, May 2004, http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/pjim03.pdf (accessed April 2, 2005)

Year	Total inmates in custody	Prisoners in custody		Inmates held in local jails	Total incarceration rate
		Federal	State
1995	1,585,586	89,538	989,004	507,044	601
1999b	1,893,115	125,682	1,161,490	605,943	672
2000c	1,935,919	133,921	1,176,269	621,149	683
2001c	1,961,247	143,337	1,180,155	631,240	685
2002c
June 30	2,020,969	148,783	1,199,949	665,475	703
December 31	d	151,618	1,209,640	d
2003c
June 30	2,078,570	159,275	1,221,501	691,301	715
Percent change, 6/30/02–6/30/03	2.9%	7.1%	1.8%	3.9%
Annual average increase, 12/31/95–6/30/03	3.7%	8.0%	2.9%	4.0%
Note: Jail counts are for mid-year (June 30) and exclude persons who were supervised outside of a jail facility. State and federal prisoner counts for 1995–2003 are for December 31.
aPersons in custody per 100,000 residents in each reference year.
bThe incarceration rate for 1999 was adjusted based on the resident population estimated for December 31, 1999, using the 2000 Census of Population and Housing.
cTotal counts include federal inmates in non-secure privately operated facilities (6,143 in 2000, 6,192 in 2001, and 6,762 (June) and 6,598 (December) in 2002, and 6,493 in 2003) and exclude those District of Columbia inmates reported in the Annual Survey of Jails.
Not available.

TABLE 3.2
Number held in jail and incarceration rate, 1995 and 1999–2003
SOURCE: Paige M. Harrison and Jennifer C. Karberg, "Jail Incarceration Rates Rose in Last 12-Month Period," in Prison and Jail Inmates at Midyear 2003, Bureau of Justice Statistics, May 2004, http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/pjim03.pdf (accessed April 2, 2005)

Year	Number held in jail	Jail incarceration rate*
2003	691,301	238
2002	665,475	231
2001	631,240	222
2000	621,149	220
1999	605,943	215
1995	507,044	193
*Number of jail inmates per 100,000 U.S. residents on July 1 of each year.

jail population throughout the period, but the proportion of women has increased. In 1995 women represented 10.2% of the local jail population; in 2003 they were 11.9%. In addition, the female population grew at an average annual rate of 6.4%, compared to the male jail population's 3.9% average annual growth rate in 2003. While the overall number of inmates in local jails has been rising, the number of juveniles in jail has dropped from 7,800 in 1995 to 6,869 in 2003.