Inside Look at Women in Prisons

There have always been women prisoners. Women used to occupy small units within men's prisons but then reformers called for facilities that specialize in women's specific needs, creating women only prisons. Today, women make up around 10 percent of the prison population with around 173,000 women incarcerated. While prisons do consist of predominantly men, women incarceration rates are continuing to rise much faster than mens; at nearly double the rate since 1985. In fact, there are eight times as many women incarcerated since 1980. This is due to many reasons including money bail, expansive law enforcement efforts, barriers to reentry that primarily affect women, and new drug sentencing laws during the war on drugs. In fact a quarter of women incarcerated are for drug crimes. Many women prisoners have experienced sexual and physical abuse from men during their lifetime, and continue to face such violence within prisons including invasive body searches. For example, 92% of women in California prisons have been battered and abused in their lifetimes. 

In terms of girls, of the around 36,000 youth incarcerated, girls comprise 15%. Girls make up a higher proportion of those incarcerated for low level offenses, with 35% of those incarcerated for offenses including truancy or curfew violations are girls and 50% of those who have run away. 

Women of color and mothers are significantly overrepresented in the criminal justice system. The rate of imprisonment for black women is double that of white women with black women representing 20% of the female prison population. This holds true for girls as well as African American and Native American girls are much more likely to be incarcerated. Additionally, two-thirds of incarcerated women in state prisons are mothers of a minor child and 1.5 million children have a parent in prison.