PEW STUDY SHOWS DRAMATIC INCREASE IN WV INMATES

(03/03/2009)

Statistics show the State of West Virginia continues to generate more and more criminals to lock up. Or it could be that law enforcement is so effective they're getting caught, or the criminal justice system is intent on locking more people up. A new Pew Center study says one out of every 68 people in West Virginia was either incarcerated or on probation in 2007. Pew says that in 1982, the figure was one out of every 226. That's a big increase over the previous 25 years. The cost of the state's corrections system also skyrocketed, from $62 million in 1998 to $181 million in 2008. The study says slightly more than 10,000 people were incarcerated in local, state and federal lockups across the Mountain State at the end of 2007. Roughly 11,000 were on probation or parole. Across the country, the prison population has climbed to 2.3 million, costing states nearly $50 billion a year. Federal and local governments spend billions more. See   Are West Virginians More Violent & Evil Than The Rest Of America? West Virginia's Prison Population To Climb To 10,000

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