PRISON POPULATION GROWING

Crime Rate Down, But 1 In 75 Incarcerated

WASHINGTON (AP) - America's prison population grew by 2.9 percent last
year, to almost 2.1 million inmates, with one of every 75 men living in
prison or jail.

The inmate population continued its rise despite a fall in the crime rate
and many states' efforts to reduce some sentences, especially for low-level
drug offenders.

The report issued Thursday by the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice
Statistics attributes much of the increase to get-tough policies enacted
during the 1980s and 90s such as mandatory drug sentences,
"three-strikes-and-your out" laws for repeat offenders, and "truth
- -in-sentencing laws." That restrict early releases.

Whether that's good or bad depends on whom you asked.

"The prison system just grows like a weed in the yard," said Vincent
Schiraldi, executive director of the Justice Policy Institute, which pushes
for a more lenient system.

But Attorney General John Ashcroft said the report shows the success of
efforts to take hard-core criminals of the street.

"It is no accident that violent crime is at a 30 year low while prison
population is up," Ashcroft said. Violent and recidivist criminals are
getting tough sentences while law-abiding Americans are enjoying
unprecedented safety.

There where 715 inmates for every 100,000 U.S. residents at midyear in
2003, up from 703 a year earlier, the report found.

The U.S. incarceration rate tops the world, according to The Sentencing
Project, another group that promotes alternatives to prison. That compares
with a rate of 169 per 100,000 residents in Mexico, 116 in Canada and 143
for England.

In 2003, 68 percent of prison and jail inmates were members of racial or
ethnic minorities, the government said. An estimated 12 percent of all
black men in their 20s were in jails or prisons, the report said.