The number of people incarcerated in American prisons is the lowest it’s been in decades. But a new report from The Vera Institute of Justice, a nonprofit research group that wants to limit mass incarceration in the United States, tells a more complex story.
In “The New Dynamics of Mass Incarceration,” researchers found that in some states, the incarcerated population has shifted away from prisons and into local jails, which primarily hold people arrested, but not yet convicted, of a crime. The report finds many jail populations are on the rise.
Jasmine Heiss with the Vera Institute says it’s challenging because of a lack of real-time information about what’s happening in local jails. She says the reason is that oversight, data collection and reporting vary from state to state and even county to county.
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