Any time you see a movie or a cable TV show depicting life in prison, there’s almost certain to be a scene showing an inmate being sexually abused by other inmates. You’ve probably even heard people joke around saying “Don’t drop the soap” if you ever end up in prison.
But what’s the truth about prison rape? Is it really as widespread as we’re made to believe? If so, do certain prisons have higher incidences of rape or is it a nationwide problem?
Read on to discover the shocking reality of rape in prison.
88,500 Prisoners Raped in the Past 12 Months
Every week, the prison watchdog group Just Detention International gets about 30 letters from prisoners across the US who say they’ve been raped. If you stretch that out over a year, you can see that more than 1,500 inmates write letters to this group complaining of sexual abuse. And that’s just the ones who come forward with their experiences and write to this particular organization.
According to a recent study released by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, an estimated 88,500 prison and jail inmates were victims of at least one sexual assault in the past year. This took place across 167 federal and state prisons, 286 jails, and 10 other facilities. The Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 estimated that about 13% of all inmates have been raped in American prisons or jails. Unfortunately, many rapes go unreported because inmates are forced by their attackers to stay silent or else be seriously injured or killed.
What’s worse is that not all sexual abuse of prisoners is committed by other prisoners. Reports of sexual abuse by prison staff have increased over the past decade, and believe it or not, women staffers actually commit sexual abuse at a disproportionate rate. While women make up just 27% of federal prison officers, they account for about 33% of sexual misconduct allegations.
One prison in Nebraska led the nation with the highest reported rate of staff-on-inmate sexual assault with 12.2%. Some may claim that some of these incidences were “consensual”, but in a prison setting where the staff wields the power, this simply isn’t a valid argument.
Texas Boasts Worst Record of Prison Sex Abuse
Of the top 10 prisons with the highest rates of sexual abuse in the country, 5 of them are located in Texas. Texas has a very crowded prison system that’s notorious for violence. Texas officials claim they’ve focused on fighting prison rapes. They also claim the numbers in the report are inaccurate and that prisoners are lying about being abused. But the truth is sexual abuse is still occurring in the state’s prisons at disproportionate rates when compared to the rest of the country.
Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003
The Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (PREA) was passed by Congress to help put an end to the huge problem of sexual abuse in prisons across the country. This act asks Federal, State, and local correctional facilities to have a zero-tolerance policy on prison rape. It requires the development of standards for detecting, preventing, reducing, and punishing prison rape, and it seeks to produce better statistics regarding the incidence of rape in prison.
But with tens of thousands of cases of prison rape each year and an increase in the number of complaints against staffers, one has to question if the PREA has had any impact at all on curbing this horrific act.
What are your thoughts on these shocking realities? What can be done to further minimize the number of prison rapes that take place? Or is it a problem that just can’t be solved?
1 comment
Carl ToersBijns
The truth about prison rape is that it is seldom reported and when it is reported its because of injuries sustained or found by staff inside a shower or other preferred place of "ambush" by prisoners. This PREA law is a farce as it is never really been strong enough to put teeth in some kind of enforcement on the act of the rape as it appears. Nothing can stop a rape from happening inside a prison or jail. It is the nature of the beast to seek out weak ones and transgender persons that are so vulnerable to such attacks. Prison administrators spend less that .5 of 1 per cent on the topic or concerns of rape. That puts the entire burden of being safe on the prisoners themselves and every now and then a consciences officer that may notice a limp, a tear, an injury or a visible sign of rape trauma and refers that to a medical person per policy. Intervention methods are limited to a mandatory viewing of a rape tape and how to report them. It is a ridiculous expectation of an inmate to report such act as the retaliatory events are often worse that the rape itself.