STATE HAS LARGEST JUMP IN INMATE POPULATION

WASHINGTON -- West Virginia had the largest increase in the nation in state
and federal inmate populations with a jump of 9.3 percent.

The Mountain State was followed by Alaska (8.9 percent), Idaho (8.5
percent) and Oregon (8.3 percent).

Overall, the U.S. inmate population in 2001 rose at the slowest pace in
almost 30 years, with blacks still far more likely to be incarcerated than
whites or Hispanics, the Justice Department said.

For every 100,000 people in the United States, 3,535 blacks were locked up,
compared with 462 whites and 1,177 Hispanics, the department said Tuesday.

One in 10 black men between the ages of 25 and 29 were incarcerated at the
end of 2001, while only 2.9 percent of Hispanic men and 1.2 percent of
white men in the same age group were in custody.

The Sentencing Project, a group that supports alternatives to
incarceration, says the black U.S. inmate population is unprecedented.

One reason the number of black inmates continues to rise is the
government's war against drugs. Convictions for drug offenses accounted for
27 percent of the increase in black inmates, compared with 7 percent for
Hispanic inmates and 15 percent for white inmates, the report said.

States are more likely to lock up people for violent offenses than for
drugs, the report said.

But the federal government is taking up the slack, with drug crimes
accounting for 59 percent of the increase in federal prison inmates -- even
as the percentage of violent offenders dropped to 10 percent from 17
percent, the report said.