Battleangel

The latest official half-yearly figures found the nation’s prison and jail population at 2,131,180 in the middle of last year, an increase of 2.3 percent over 2003.

The United States has incarcerated 726 people per 100,000 of its population, seven to 10 times as many as most other democracies. The rate for England is 142 per 100,000, for France 91 and for Japan 58.

The figures issued by the department’s statistical unit showed that 12.6 percent of black males in their late twenties were behind bars. The comparable rate for Hispanic males was 3.6 percent and for whites 1.7 percent.

Criminologists attribute the growth in the prison population to “get tough on crime” policies that have subjected hundreds of thousands of nonviolent drug and property offenders to long mandatory sentences.

In addition, the United States jails around 283,000 people with serious mental illnesses and almost 92,000 foreigners.

Source: CNN

Besting even China, Russia and Iran. Now that is something.