Subscribe to Breaking News
Loading ...60,000 inmates sexually abused every year
06.23.2009 8:55am EDT
(Washington) A federal commission on prison rape has concluded that the risk of being attacked depends greatly on the type of prisoner, and where the inmate is locked up.
More than 60,000 inmates are sexually abused every year, according to a report being made public Tuesday by the National Prison Rape Elimination Commission. The eight-member panel was formed under the 2003 Prison Rape Elimination Act.Based on a 2007 survey of tens of thousands of incarcerated people, 4.5 percent of those surveyed reported being sexually abused in the previous 12 months – and more prisoners claimed abuse by staff than by other inmates.
Among the key findings of the report aimed at reducing the amount of rape, sexual assault and sexual abuse behind bars, the panel found:
- Who gets abused depends a great deal on where they are incarcerated. Ten facilities studied had high rates, between 9 percent and almost 16 percent, whereas six facilities reported no abuse at all for the past year. The commission said prison management must show leadership in stopping such abuse.
- Inmates in jails reported fewer instances of rape than in prisons.
- Inmates who were short, young, gay or female were more likely to be victimized than other inmates.
To fight the problem, the commission says prison authorities should adopt more internal monitoring and external oversight. They also say prison officials need to improve investigation of claims of sexual assault and rape, because currently many victims cannot safely and easily come forward.
After the prison rape report is sent to Congress, the attorney general is to create new national standards for detecting and preventing rape and sexual assault in prisons, jails and detention facilities.
I would like to know of those raped in jail or prison, how many have disabilities. I hope you can publish this part of the study…i hope that looking at this aspect of vulnerability to sexual assault was part of the study. thank you.
It’s simple, stay out of prison and this stuff won’t happen!
Tom, rape is not part of a prison sentence. We all know that innocent people also end up in prison along with the guilty. Who is more likely to be raped?
Tom, your response is akin to asking for it by the type of clothing you wear.
Prison rape is punishment without due process, Tom. No judge has handed down a sentence to be raped. Juries do not hand out rape sentences. Rape is cruel and unusual, by nature.
“Don’t go to prison” is not an acceptable answer to prison rape.
As we can see from Tom’s response, many people don’t want to stop prison rape, they see that as a desirable form of punishment. Until that attitude changes prison rape will continue.
I should add that with, I believe, half of all American prisoners being there for non-violent drug offenses, this attitude that prisoners deserve to be raped is particularly heinous. No one deserves to be raped for smoking a little weed.
I seriously doubt the accuracy of some of their findings. Women are more likely to be raped in prison than men? Yeah, right! Women are more likely to admit it than men. That’s another problem with tackling this problem. It’s really hard to fix such a problem in a prison environment because the level of control and abuse is so extreme and as others have mentioned there is unfortunately not a whole lot of concern about how badly inmates are abused, hell prison rape, or the insenuation of it, is still used to get a cheap laugh in movies, television shows and even product ads.
TampaZeke. I beleive that this article ing reefering to male-to-female transexuals who are still defined’ by this country’s archaic laws’ as men and therefore are sentence to serve their time in men’s prisons and jails.
hey Tom, fuck you dude. You obviously don’t know how easy it is to end up in Prison these days. Some 17 year olds are sentenced two years just for smoking a joint within 1000 feet of a school. Like they knew…
hey mark…well dont ask me to cry for a teen who got 2 years in jail for smoking pot near a school…lets review:..don’t do drugs..don’t go to jail…pretty simple solution…..
Women in general get raped more than men, and yes they report it, but not with any sort of frequency. Meanwhile, men getting raped?
Who the hell cares?
Lastly, this has nothing to do with being gay or lesbian. Barely has anything to do with being human.
menstruartor you certainly are a compassionate person. Who the hell cares? What kind of a question is that? With your attitude don’t be surprised when people take the same attitude towards you and your issues.
This kind of behavior is unacceptable our justice system should be ashame it’s these acts that causes the spread of diseases such as aids and other sexually transmitted diseases because i know for a fact that they are not passing around condoms in the prison system !!!