California: The State of Incarceration

Source: vera.org

Despite California’s reputation as a progressive state, it is one of the epicenters of mass incarceration in the United States, incarcerating more people than any other state except Texas. Annually, California law enforcement agencies make almost 800,000 arrests and more than 600,000 bookings into county jails, and courts send almost 30,000 people to prison.† The result is that, on an average day in California, around 60,000 people are held in county jails and close to 100,000 people are incarcerated in state prisons.† In addition to people in criminal custody, approximately 1,800 people are detained by ICE in California.†

The state is set to spend over $18 billion on the criminal legal system in fiscal year 2023, which does not include city- or county-level spending. In 2021, California cities spent $14 billion on policing, and counties spent $19 billion on policing, jails, probation, and the judicial system. And despite the state’s commitment to racial equity, people of color disproportionately carry this burden—a direct result of decades of policy failure and systemic disinvestment in housing, employment, treatment, education, and other social services. Although Black and Latinx Californians make up 47 percent of the state’s population, they together comprise 66 percent of the county jail and 74 percent of the prison populations.

However, a lack of data transparency obscures the full picture of incarceration across the state and makes it difficult to disrupt the status quo. Data is strewn across various governmental websites, hidden in spreadsheets and antiquated databases, and generally inaccessible to all but the most determined and technologically savvy users. In this new tool, Vera has gathered and mapped an array of criminal legal system data—from facility population and budget data to arrest and racial demographic statistics. With access to more comprehensive, clearer data, we can work together to transform California from a state of incarceration to one that truly invests in safety, wellness, and racial justice.

Read the full article

 

Related posts

Subscribe
Notify of

We welcome a lively discussion with all view points - keeping in mind...

 

  1. Submissions must be in English
  2. Your submission will be reviewed by one of our volunteer moderators. Moderating decisions may be subjective.
  3. Please keep the tone of your comment civil and courteous. This is a public forum.
  4. Swear words should be starred out such as f*k and s*t and a**
  5. Please avoid the use of derogatory labels.  Always use person-first language.
  6. Please stay on topic - both in terms of the organization in general and this post in particular.
  7. Please refrain from general political statements in (dis)favor of one of the major parties or their representatives.
  8. Please take personal conversations off this forum.
  9. We will not publish any comments advocating for violent or any illegal action.
  10. We cannot connect participants privately - feel free to leave your contact info here. You may want to create a new / free, readily available email address that are not personally identifiable.
  11. Please refrain from copying and pasting repetitive and lengthy amounts of text.
  12. Please do not post in all Caps.
  13. If you wish to link to a serious and relevant media article, legitimate advocacy group or other pertinent web site / document, please provide the full link. No abbreviated / obfuscated links. Posts that include a URL may take considerably longer to be approved.
  14. We suggest to compose lengthy comments in a desktop text editor and copy and paste them into the comment form
  15. We will not publish any posts containing any names not mentioned in the original article.
  16. Please choose a short user name that does not contain links to other web sites or identify real people.  Do not use your real name.
  17. Please do not solicit funds
  18. No discussions about weapons
  19. If you use any abbreviation such as Failure To Register (FTR), Person Forced to Register (PFR) or any others, the first time you use it in a thread, please expand it for new people to better understand.
  20. All commenters are required to provide a real email address where we can contact them.  It will not be displayed on the site.
  21. Please send any input regarding moderation or other website issues via email to moderator [at] all4consolaws [dot] org
  22. We no longer post articles about arrests or accusations, only selected convictions. If your comment contains a link to an arrest or accusation article we will not approve your comment.
  23. If addressing another commenter, please address them by exactly their full display name, do not modify their name. 
ACSOL, including but not limited to its board members and agents, does not provide legal advice on this website.  In addition, ACSOL warns that those who provide comments on this website may or may not be legal professionals on whose advice one can reasonably rely.  
 

3 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

How much of that $ is spent in sex offender registration and associated hysteria?

California is the state with the highest population in the country. So of course they’re going to have more people in jails and prisons. That number is probably a lot lower on a per capita basis. But the worst mistake this shoddy piece of journalism makes is to lump Blacks in with Latinos when they compare disparities. African Americans are only 5% of California’s population, so their disparity is greater compared to Latinos who make up a much larger percentage of California’s population. But the California black incarceration disparity isn’t as bad as Wisconsin which is horrific. From what I read, blacks make up 42% of the prison population, but only 6% state residents.