Stay Informed

Get the latest updates:

Prison Policy Initiative newsletter (?)
And our other newsletters: Research Library updates (?) Prison gerrymandering campaign (?)

Email:
Name (optional):
State (optional):

A guide to data sources for advocates seeking reform of the criminal legal system

Last modified July 2024

Table of Contents

Policing

Crime Rates

Police Contact

Incarceration

State and federal prisons

Jails

Conditions of confinement

Probation, Parole, and Reentry

Special Populations

Youth

Native Americans

Immigration

Local Data

Appendices

The Prison Policy Initiative uses a number of different data sources to produce research exposing the harms of mass incarceration. Below we provide descriptions of and links to helpful sources we have used. These sources are organized in sections about policing, incarceration, community supervision and reentry, and special populations, and each source references an appendix that provides additional details about the data sources we discuss (e.g., how old is the data, are breakdowns along gender or racial categories available, etc.). Many national sources we use don’t show people the details of what’s happening in their communities; for that reason, we’ve provided starting points in the final section about local data to help people locate information about their counties, cities, and states.

If you have questions or we can be of more assistance, please contact us.

Policing

Crime rates

Do you want to know:

• The crime rate in your state or city and how it has changed over time?
• How the crime rate in your state compares to rates in other states?
• How many women were arrested for robbery last year?
  • How many youths under 18?
• How many assaults go unreported to police?
  • The difference between the number of police reports for assault and the number of people who report being assaulted?

Look to:

• The FBI’s Crime Data Explorer This tool will show you how many crimes have been reported to police either nationally or in a given state. If you need to know who police are arresting (i.e., how old, what race/ethnicity, and what sex), you’ll find that data under the Crime Data Explorer’s Arrest tab. (In 2021, the FBI changed the data collection system, resulting in a data gap as thousands of police agencies did not submit data in 2021. In 2022, the reporting and participation of agencies began to increase, but many large police agencies - including the NYPD and the LAPD - still had not submitted data under the new collection system. For more information on these data issues, see 4 Reasons We Should Worry About Missing Crime Data from the Marshall Project.)
• The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) This survey allows us to see the difference between the number of police reports for personal and property crimes (or the number of arrests for those crimes) and the number of people and households that actually experience being personally attacked, threatened, stolen from, etc. It’s a Bureau of Justice (BJS) survey that asks U.S. households to report their personal experiences with crime; the answers become the basis for the data points in publications like Violent Victimization by Race and Ethnicity and Criminal Victimization.
  
  BJS also offers two relevant data analysis tools that allow users to generate tables based on crime and arrest data including “offense,” police reporting, victim’s demographic information, incident characteristics, and more.
  • The Bureau of Justice Statistics’ (BJS) Law Enforcement Agency Reported Crime Analysis Tool (LEARCAT) provides the estimated national, state, and local agency crime statistics available through the FBI’s Crime Data Explorer, but this tool offers additional custom views of the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data.
  • The NCVS Dashboard provides national estimates of personal and household victimization from 1993 to the most recent year that NCVS data are available.
  • The homepage for both tools include a helpful User’s Guide.
• The Prison Policy Initiative’s Research Library section on Police and Policing curates policy-related research.

For more on these sources, see Appendix A.

Police contact

Do you want to know:

• How many people call the police nationally to report crimes? How many people call the police for non-crime emergencies? How have these numbers changed over time?
• What the racial, gender, and age breakdowns are for the people police pull over for traffic stops?
• How often police contact results in police violence?

Look to:

• The Police-Public Contact Survey
  What happens when a person comes into contact with the police? Why has the contact happened in the first place? Did someone call the police, did the police officer stop someone in traffic, stop and frisk them on a sidewalk? This BJS survey answers these questions on a national level. Key reports produced from this survey include the Contacts Between Police and the Public series (updated every three years or so) and Police Use of Nonfatal Force, 2002-11.
• The National Survey of Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) Data Archive
  This annual survey is useful for learning about who is coming into contact with the police in terms of characteristics like race, gender, health status, and drug use. The survey is not particularly focused on criminal legal system experiences, but it does ask respondents about lifetime and past year arrest history.¹ The website offers a helpful tool with which you can compare the demographic and health information of people with these criminal legal system experiences against those who have not been arrested.
  
  For example, users on the homepage can select from the Analyze Data dropdown. “Data Analysis System” takes users to a page with a “Start Analysis” panel on which users can select “NSDUH” for a list of surveys going back to 2002.
  
  Clicking a survey will take users to a crosstab creator. Subjects related to Corrections are found under Special Topics. Users can, for example, populate the Row Variable with “# of Times Arrested and Booked Past 12 Months” and cross reference it with a Drug Treatment topic like “Ever Received Alcohol or Drug Treatment.”
  
  You can find the user’s guide for SAMHSA’s Data Tools here.

• Mapping Police Violence
  This site allows users to view police killings since 2013, by state, local police department, by whether the officer was on duty and whether they were charged, and by victim characteristics such as race, gender, mental health status, whether they were armed, etc. The data have been analyzed to produce “scorecards” for each police department and sheriff’s department for which there are data.

• Police Scorecard
  This site offers a “scorecard” for police departments based on data from numerous government databases and the Mapping Police Violence database, supplemented by local agency publications and media reports. All the sources are listed here. The scorecards include information on arrests and police violence by race, disparities in arrests for low level offenses by race and ethnicity, and other detailed information about police departments and sheriff’s departments.

For more on these sources, see Appendix B.

Incarceration

State and federal prisons

Do you want to know:

• The prison populations in each state for women? Men? The racial breakdowns of these populations?
• How populations in private prisons have changed over time?
• How much time people are serving in prisons and for what?
• How many people in prison are parents of young children?

Look to:

• The Correctional Statistical Analysis Tool (CSAT) — Prisoners
  This Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) data analysis tool offers users the ability to create custom tables and maps based on data from the National Prisoner Statistics Program (NPS) and the National Corrections Reporting Program (NCRP). The earliest data collected that is available in CSAT-Prisoners is from 1978.
  • The National Prisoner Statistics Program (NPS) data offers one-day snapshots of year-end populations in state and federal prisons, as well as annual admissions and releases. Some key reports based on NPS data include the annual Correctional Populations in the United States and Prisoners series, and special reports like Aging of the State Prison Population, 1993-2013.
  • The National Corrections Reporting Program (NCRP) data includes characteristics of people admitted to or released from state prisons, or in the year-end state prison populations including sex, offense type, age at and year of admission, type of admission, year of admission, age on December 31 of the reporting year, highest level of education, maximum sentence length, race/ethnicity, mandatory release year, parole eligibility year, and the projected release year.
• The Survey of Prison Inmates (SPI)
  This national BJS survey collects more detailed information about people in state and federal prisons than any other, and unlike most other studies, it collects information from incarcerated people themselves. Some important data points that it has that can be hard to find in other sources include:
  • Socioeconomic characteristics
  • Family backgrounds
  • Experiences in prison related to programming, discipline, health, and family contact
  
  One clear benefit of this survey is that it provides more accurate data on race in prisons because the demographic information is gathered directly from the incarcerated people it describes rather than relying on prison records, which may reflect the guesses or assumptions of prison officials. One drawback is that the data cannot be broken down state-by-state — all findings are at the national level. There are also often long gaps between these surveys (e.g., until 2016, the most recent was in 2004).
  
  Some key reports based on this survey include Profile of Prison Inmates, 2016, Parents in Prison and Their Minor Children, Disabilities Reported by Prisoners, Veterans in Prison, and Source and Use of Firearms Involved in Crimes.
• The Prison Policy Initiative’s Research Library section on Incarceration Rates, Growth, and Causes curates all the policy-related research about incarceration trends that we learn about. Many other sections may be relevant to your research, however, so browse or search the full Research Library.

For more on these sources, see Appendix C.

Jails

Do you want to know:

• How many annual jail admissions there are?
• Jail incarceration rates by race, ethnicity, and sex?
• The percentage of people in jail being held pretrial? The number of people incarcerated for misdemeanors?

Look to:

• The Census of Jails (COJ)
  When policy makers say a jail is overcrowded, what does that mean in terms of data? It’s a comparison of the number of people in a jail to what’s called the jail’s “rated capacity” or “design capacity.”² This BJS survey provides these data points - and more - for all local jails and the 12 Federal Bureau of Prisons facilities that function as jails.
  
  A key report based on this survey is Census of Jails, 2005-2019 - Statistical Tables. For state-level charts and statistics based on the Census of Jails, see the Prison Policy Initiative 2024 publication, New data and visualizations spotlight states’ reliance on excessive jailing. The Census of Jails is the only survey of jails that can be used to compare jails at the state level; unfortunately, it is only conducted every six years or so.
• The Annual Survey of Jails (ASJ)
  This BJS survey provides national estimates on the number of people confined in jails based on a sample of about 950 local jails. Unlike the Census of Jails, this data is collected every year, and is helpful for tracking recent jail trends nationally. In years when the Census of Jails is not conducted, this survey is the basis of the annual BJS Jail Inmates report series.
• The Vera Institute of Justice’s Incarceration Trends tool
  This site provides incarceration trends by state, county, urbanicity (rural, urban, suburban, etc.), gender, race, and conviction status.
  
  This tool has three main limitations:
  • Data does not include federal jails.
  • Not every county or state has data available for every metric, though most do, and Vera’s experts have created estimates for some of the missing data.
  • Although almost all other agencies calculate incarceration rates per 100,000 persons or per 100,000 adults, Vera calculates per 100,000 persons ages 15-64. However, the underlying dataset is available and users with data experience can calculate compatible rates per persons using the raw data and other available population estimates.
• The NYU Public Safety Lab’s Jail Data Initiative
  This program web-scrapes local jail rosters in hundreds of counties across the country. The data available varies by county, but it’s worth checking to see what data is available for your county. What’s available could include data about:
  • Racial disparities in admissions, population, and types of charges
  • Incarceration for failure to appear in court
  • Failure to pay fines or fees
  • Cannabis-related charges
  • Contempt of court
• The Prison Policy Initiative’s Research Library section on Jails curates all the policy-related research about jails that we learn about.

For more on these sources, see Appendix D.

Conditions of confinement

Do you want to know:

• What the quality of medical treatment is in correctional facilities?
• How many incarcerated people with substance abuse history have access to services?
• What relationship exists between being arrested and mental health? Poverty? Employment?
• The number of people who have died in correctional facilities? The causes of death?

Look to:

• The Census of Jails (COJ)
  TThe 2019 edition of this BJS survey provides data on facility drug treatment programs. BJS reports the results from this survey in Census of Jails, 2005-2019 - Statistical Tables.
• The Survey of Prison Inmates
  In addition to providing self-reported data on demographics, sentence lengths, and committing offenses for prison populations, this BJS survey also provides data about:
  • Drug and alcohol use and treatment
  • Mental and physical health and treatment
  • Facility programs
  • Rule violations
  
  A key report based on this survey is Alcohol and Drug Use and Treatment Reported by Prisoners. The health data from this survey and report are compatible with the data reported in previous years from the National Inmate Survey (see below), so you can see what has (or hasn’t) changed over the years.
• The National Inmate Survey
  Although this BJS survey is primarily used to gather data about sexual assault in prisons and jails, it also collects a lot of data we have on health problems and treatment in prisons and jails. Key reports based on this survey include Drug Use, Dependence, and Abuse Among State Prisoners and Jail Inmates, 2007-2009; Indicators of Mental Health Problems Reported by Prisoners and Jail Inmates, 2011-2012; Disabilities Among Prison and Jail Inmates, 2011-12; and Medical Problems of State and Federal Prisoners and Jail Inmates, 2011-12.
• Mortality in Correctional Institutions (MCI)
  This BJS survey collects death records from the 50 state prison systems, Federal Bureau of Prisons, and 2,800 local jail jurisdictions. Some key reports based on this survey include Mortality in Local Jails, 2000-2019 - Statistical Tables and Mortality in State and Federal Prisons, 2001-2019 - Statistical Tables.
• Reuters Investigates: Dying Inside
  This site collected jail-by-jail mortality data for each state through records requests in every jail whose population is 750 or more. While no longer an active data collection, the site features downloadable files that show deaths by cause and by county for each year from 2008-2019.
• Huffington Post’s Jail Deaths database
  This site collected data on people who died in jails and police lockups in the year after Sandra Bland’s death in July of 2015, based on record requests and monitoring news reports. While no longer an active data collection, this project and its related publications offer much more detail and context than government data collections, including the particular circumstances of many of those who lost their lives in jail.
• The National Resource Center for Correctional Oversight (NRCCO)
  This project from the Prison and Jail Innovation Lab (PJIL) at the Lyndon B Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin offers numerous resources regarding prison and jail oversight, including interactive maps comparing oversight bodies throughout the U.S. and profiles of these entities (coming soon).
• The Prison Policy Initiative’s Conditions of Confinement Research Library curates the research we’ve found on conditions of confinement in prisons and jails. For information on phone justice in prisons and jails, see our Regulating the Phone Industry page.

For more on these sources, see Appendix E.

Probation, Parole, and Reentry

Do you want to know:

• How many adults are on parole or probation in your state? How these numbers have changed over time?
• How much incarcerating people for technical probation and parole violations costs your state?
• What the probation and parole outcomes are in your state, i.e., are people completing their supervision successfully or returning to custody?
• What the estimated racial, gender, and age breakdowns of recidivism are in the U.S.?

Look to:

• The Annual Probation Survey and Annual Parole Survey
  These BJS surveys provide national- and state-level data for all 50 states, the federal system, and the District of Columbia. Data includes:
  • Number of adults on state and federal probation or parole on a given day.
  • Number of adults entering and exiting probation and parole supervision each year (and whether they are “exiting” back to incarceration).
  • The characteristics of adults under supervision.
  
  Key reports based on this survey include the annual (or sometimes biannual) Probation and Parole in the United States and Correctional Populations in the United States series.
• The Robina Institute’s Profiles in Parole Release and Revocation
  Much of the data we rely on come in the form of hard numbers. Descriptive data (i.e., data that tells the story about a topic or provides policy details) can also be valuable. The Robina Institute at the University of Minnesota tells the story of parole through detailed state profiles, produced between 2016-2019. They offer profiles of each of the 34 states with discretionary parole systems, accessible under the “Area of Expertise” tab on the website. Each profile describes a state’s release and revocation system, centralizing many important details about parole eligibility, hearings, and post-release policies. Additionally, the Robina Institute produced a detailed report in 2014 about probation policies and practices - including revocation - in 21 states.
• Council of State Government Justice Center’s Confined and Costly
  This site offers a national and state-by-state analysis of how probation and parole violations fill prisons and burden budgets in 2019. Data includes:
  • Number and percent of state prison populations and annual admissions to prison that are due to supervision violations.
  • Breakdowns of the types of violations (i.e., technical violations vs. new offenses, probation vs. parole violations).
  • Estimated annual cost to states for incarcerating people for violations.
  
  Data does not include the impact on local jails.
• The National Survey of Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) Data Archive
  In addition to providing information about who comes into contact with the police (see NSDUH under Police Contact for the full description of this survey), this annual survey is useful for learning about the characteristics (race, gender, health status, drug use, etc.) of people with recent probation and parole histories.

• Recidivism of State Prisoners
  This BJS series of reports provides the data from several studies that track samples of incarcerated people released from state prisons. The studies document the arrest, conviction, and incarceration experiences of the formerly incarcerated people within and outside of the state that released them. Several “waves” have been studied; most recently, BJS published a 5-year follow-up report about people released from prisons in 34 states in 2012 and a 10-year follow-up report about people released in 24 states in 2008.
• The Prison Policy Initiative’s research libraries on Probation and Parole and Recidivism and Reentry curates the research we’ve found on these topics.

For more on these sources, see Appendix F.

Special Populations

Youth

Do you want to know:

• The demographics of the youth incarcerated in your state? The reason they’re incarcerated? How long they’ve been incarcerated?
• Whether gender impacts time spent in detention?
• The patterns of racial disparity across the country? How states compare on this topic?

Look to:

• The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s Statistical Briefing Book
  This office provides national, state, and county level information on juvenile crime, victimization, incarceration, court caseloads, and residential placement facilities. Some key web tools include:
  • Easy Access to the Census of Juveniles in Residential Placement (EZACJRP), based on a study conducted every other year, provides state and national data on the characteristics of youth held in juvenile facilities, including demographics, length of stay, and the most serious committing offense. The tool features state profiles, state comparisons, and national crosstabs (which is useful for identifying relationships between variables like race and time in detention).
  • Easy Access to Juvenile Populations provides overall youth population profiles on a national, state, and county level with the functionality to compare states or counties. These numbers are helpful for comparing the statistics from the EZACJRP to the overall youth population in various geographies (for example, when trying to determine racial and ethnic disproportionality in the juvenile justice context).
• The W. Haywood Burns Institute’s United States of Disparities
  This data project organizes the information compiled by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Prevention to highlight racial disparities in states across the country. Users can click on any state on a color-coded map to access a detailed state profile that includes one-day counts, annual decision points, detention status, reform efforts, and state advisory groups.
• The Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Kids Count Data Center
  This site collects data about youth populations in the U.S. Although this project is not focused on the criminal legal system, it allows users to create custom reports that include national, state, county, and city data on youth populations in correctional settings. Users can choose a location on the landing page and under topics select filters “Safety and Risky Behaviors” and “Juvenile Justice.”

For more on these sources, see Appendix G.

Native Americans

Do you want to know:

• How many people are incarcerated in jails on tribal lands, including how many youth under age 18, and how many unconvicted people?
• Why people are being incarcerated on tribal lands (crimes against persons, nuisance crimes, property crimes, etc.)?
• How jail capacity or overcrowding on tribal lands has changed over the years?

Look to:

• Survey of Jails in Indian Country
  Who's in jail on tribal lands? For what and for how long? How many people die in these jails? The Survey of Jails in Indian Country answers these questions. The survey is used to produce the annual Jails in Indian Country series, which include state- and facility-specific population data.

For more on these sources, see Appendix H.

Immigration

Do you want to know:

• How many people U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) are arresting? How long immigrants are being detained?
• The number of cases pending in immigration courts? The length of time it takes to resolve cases?
• What the nationalities are for immigrants awaiting the resolution of their court cases at home compared to those who are detained pending their dispositions?

Look to:

• U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
  ICE is required by law to make certain records public. Their website regularly updates spreadsheets that you can download by navigating to the pages below.
  • The Dedicated and Non-Dedicated Facility spreadsheet is located near the bottom of the Facilities Inspections page under Related Documents. It provides the locations and average daily detainee populations for both ICE facilities and jails contracted by ICE.
  • Also under Related Documents, the Over 72-hour ICE Detention Facilities spreadsheet lists ICE’s active adult detention facilities that are authorized to hold detainees for longer than 72 hours (this list does not include juvenile or family residential facilities).
  • Fiscal Year ICE Statistics is located on the Detention Management page under Detention Statistics. It provides data on:
    • Alternatives to incarceration (counts and average length of time in programs)
    • Numbers for detention
    • Booking
    • Release
    • Average daily population
    • Average time detained
    
    The data is organized by disposition, facility type, criminal legal system involvement, and arresting agency. The spreadsheet provides data breakdowns of ICE Facilities that include:
    • Average time served in each facility.
    • Number of detainees by classification level.
    • Threat level by criminal legal system involvement and gender.
• National Immigrant Justice Center’s Transparency Project
  This organization has obtained thousands of documents through litigation from ICE. Their site features reports and helpful resources to make sense of ICE data in addition to the documents obtained through this organization’s court battles. Key resources include:
  • Comprehensive ICE Detention Facility List includes data on types of contracts, demographics, medical care providers, and inspections history for more than 1,000 federal facilities that detain immigrants, including county jails, Bureau of Prisons facilities, Office of Refugee Resettlement centers, hospitals, and hotels. (Customs and Border Protection facilities are not included.)
  • Here Is What We’ve Learned From It, And A Link For You To Study The Data Yourself provides analysis of the data readers can find in the Comprehensive ICE Detention Facility List.
  • Deaths in Detention report examines the 15 “Detainee Death Reviews” ICE released from December 2015 through April 2017. Eight of the 15 public death reviews show that inadequate medical care contributed or led to the person’s death. The physicians conducting the analysis also found evidence of substandard medical practices in all but one of the remaining reviews.
• Syracuse University’s TRAC Immigration Tools
  These tools provide statistics and graphs related to ICE, Customs and Border Protection enforcement, and immigration courts.
• The Prison Policy Initiative’s Immigration Research Library curates the research we’ve found about the incarceration of immigrants and immigration enforcement.

For more on these sources, see Appendix I.

Local Data

Do you want to know:

• What agencies in your area have the data you need?
• How to file records requests with local agencies? What to expect from records request processes?
• The most recent data on your topic?

Look to:

• Agency Websites
  Local government websites vary in the amount of helpful data they provide, but they’re often the best place to begin. If you want to know the daily population counts for your local jail, check the sheriff’s or jail’s website to see if this information is available. If you want to know the arrest rates in your city, the website of your local police department may provide this information.
  • The Prison Policy Initiative’s Correctional Facility Locator 2020 provides a searchable list of state and county correctional facilities. In addition, this resource allows you to see the growth of prison populations from 2010 to 2020.
• Muckrock
  This site catalogues requests for records that have been made to local (as well as state and federal) agencies. It shows the status of those requests, shows correspondence between the requester and the government agency, and maintains digital copies of information that the agency provided. A search of this site can let you know if the information you’re looking for has already been requested and supplied.

• Getting the information you need: A public records how-to guide
  This guide provides guidance on the information kept by different agencies and how to submit a request for records (if the information you need isn’t already available online).
• State Statistical Analysis Centers
  These sites exist in every U.S. state except Texas.³ They collect, analyze, and report statistics on crime and justice. The information reported varies by state, but it’s worth checking to see if your state provides useful local data about the criminal legal system. The institutions that serve as state Statistical Analysis Centers may also be able to answer your questions about what information is available and how to access it.
• Council of State Governments Justice Center’s Justice Counts dashboards
  This site compiles admissions, release, and population data about prisons, jails, probation, and parole. The state and county coverage is not uniformly helpful, but Justice Counts provides a good litmus test for the availability of state data and is especially useful for identifying the current data gaps in each state. For example, it points to which of these state-level data are aggregated, publicly available, and accessible without requiring records requests.
• Other state-specific organizations
  Other state-based organizations collect and make accessible detailed information and data. Finding these organizations can often help you avoid replicating work that they’ve already done. For example, in New York, the Correctional Association of New York has a detailed data dashboard that includes information on the number of people incarcerated, unusual incidents, and more.

Appendices

Appendix A: Data sources on crime rates

Name of data source	Published by	Populations	Basic unit(s) of analysis	Type of data (self-reported, administrative, media reports, other)	Level(s) of data (National, state, county, city, etc.)	Demographic breakdowns offered	Special topics covered	Frequency of data publication	Earliest data easily accessible online
Crime Data Explorer (Uniform Crime Reporting Program and National Incident-Based Reporting System data)	FBI	U.S. population	Offenses known to law enforcement; persons arrested	Reported by law enforcement agencies	National, state, region, city, individual agency (including university/college)	Sex, age, race, urbanicity of area, offense type and characteristics.	Homicide victims, offenders, and circumstances; hate crime; trends over time. Additional data are available from the same website about police employees, assaults on law enforcement officers, human trafficking, cargo theft, and more.	Annual or more frequently. Depending on participation rates among law enforcement agencies, some data are reported quarterly (i.e. if fewer than 60% of agencies participate, certain data are not reported).	1985
National Crime Victimization Survey	BJS	Individuals age 12 and older, households. Does not include people in military barracks or correctional facilities.	Victimizations (persons and households reporting victimization)	Self-reported	National, region	Age, sex, race, education, employment, family income, marital status, military history, type of crime, severity of crime.	Personal and household victimization, excluding homicide; injuries and losses; time and location of crime; medical expenses incurred; victim-offender(s) relationship; characteristics of offender(s); self-protective actions taken by the victim and results of those actions; whether crime was reported to police and reasons for reporting or not reporting; offender use of weapons, drugs, or alcohol.	Annual since 1973.	1992
Law Enforcement Agency Reported Crime Analysis Tool (based on National Incident-Based Reporting System data)	BJS	U.S. population	Persons arrested	Reported by law enforcement agencies	National, individual agency	Age, age/sex combined, age/race combined, offense type.	Trends over time; age-arrest curves.	Annual	2016
National Crime Victimization Survey Dashboard	BJS	Individuals age 12 and older, households. Does not include people in military barracks or correctional facilities.	Victimizations (persons and households reporting victimization)	Self-reported	National, region	Individual: sex, age, race, Hispanic origin, race/Hispanic origin combined, household income, marital status, offense type, population size of area, region. Household: Head of household's sex, age, race, Hispanic origin, race/Hispanic origin combined; household income, household size, population size of area, region.	Personal and household victimization, excluding homicide; injury; location of incident; medical treatment of injuries; presence of a weapon and weapon category; victim services; victim-offender relationship; trends over time.	Annual	1993

Appendix B: Data sources on police contact

Name of data source	Published by	Populations	Basic unit(s) of analysis	Type of data (self-reported, administrative, media reports, other)	Level(s) of data (National, state, county, city, etc.)	Demographic breakdowns offered	Special topics covered	Frequency of data publication	Earliest data easily accessible online
Police-Public Contact Survey (supplement to NCVS)	BJS	Individuals age 16 and older	Instances of police-resident contact	Self-reported from national sample of U.S. population	National	Sex, age, race/ethnicity, household income.	Type of contact (traffic vs street stop, etc.); reason for contact; experience of nonfatal threats or use of force during contact; perception of force as necessary or excessive.	Periodically since 1996 (about every 3 years). Last year of data available is 2018.	1996
National Survey of Drug Use and Health Data Archive	U.S. Department of Health and Human Services	U.S. population	Mental health and substance abuse disorders	Self-reports from U.S. residents	National	N/A.	Extensive list of cross-referenceable topics that include age of last drug use, drug use in past 12 months, number of times booked in a jail in past 12 months, and serious psychological stress in past 12 months.	Annual	1998
Mapping Police Violence	Mapping Police Violence (NGO)	U.S. population	Killings by police	Collected from use-of-force databases and supplemented by independent research	National, state, region, city	Race, sex	Armed status, type of force used, police agency involved, whether an officer was charged, and police encounter type (violent, nonviolent, unknown, etc.).	Updated every weekend.	2013
Police Scorecard		U.S. population	Arrests and police violence by race, disparities in arrests for low level offenses by race and ethnicity, and more.	Collected from numerous government databases and the Mapping Police Violence database, supplemented by local agency publications and media reports	National, state, region, city	Race, ethnicity, offense, sex	Police funding, police violence and use of force, police killings, police misconduct complaints, police use of less-lethal force, race/ethnic disparities in low level offense arrests, total arrests by type, rate of solved homicides, and more.	Point-in-time.	Varies by data point. See the methodology.

Appendix C: Data sources on state and federal prisons

Name of data source	Published by	Populations	Basic unit(s) of analysis	Type of data (self-reported, administrative, media reports, other)	Level(s) of data (National, state, county, city, etc.)	Demographic breakdowns offered	Special topics covered	Frequency of data publication	Earliest data easily accessible online
National Prisoner Statistics Program	BJS	U.S. prison population	Individuals incarcerated in state prisons or under correctional control	Reported by correctional agencies	National, state	Race, sex, most serious committing offense, composition by status (probation, prison, parole), citizenship.	Number of people in private facilities and local jails, facility capacity, persons age 17 and younger.	Annual.	1926
Correctional Statistical Analysis Tool	BJS	U.S. prison population	Individuals incarcerated in state prisons or under correctional control	Reported by state correctional agencies	National, state	Race, sex, most serious committing offense, composition by status (probation, prison, parole), citizenship.	Number of people in private facilities and local jails, facility capacity, persons age 17 and younger.	Annual	1978
National Corrections Reporting	BJS	U.S. prison population	Individuals incarcerated in state prisons or under correctional control	Reported by state correctional agencies	National	Age, race/ethnicity, sex, veteran status, educational attainment, prior convictions, committing offense(s), county of commitment, time served.	Type of admission (new conviction, parole violation, etc.), type of release (mandatory release, parole, escape, etc.), population by facility type.	Annual.	1983
Survey of Prison Inmates	BJS	U.S. prison population	Individuals incarcerated in state prisons	Prison records combined with self-reports from incarcerated people	National	Age, race/ethnicity, sex, criminal histories, socioeconomic characteristics, family backgrounds, committing offense(s), sentence length.	Drug and alcohol treatment, mental and physical health treatment, institutional programs, rules violations.	Periodic. Last year of data available is 2016.	1974

Appendix D: Data sources on jails

Name of data source	Published by	Populations	Basic unit(s) of analysis	Type of data (self-reported, administrative, media reports, other)	Level(s) of data (National, state, county, city, etc.)	Demographic breakdowns offered	Special topics covered	Frequency of data publication	Earliest data easily accessible online
Census of Jails	BJS	U.S. jail and community supervision populations	Individuals incarcerated in jails or under supervision by jails, jails in a state or region, average daily population.	Reported by jail officials	National, state, region	Adult or youth, race/ethnicity, sex, citizenship status, conviction status, severity of offense.	Parole/probation violations, contracted jail cells, jail rated capacity, jail jurisdiction size, jails under court order, jail function.	Periodic. Last year of data available is 2019.	1970
Annual Survey of Jails	BJS	U.S. jail and community supervision populations	Individuals incarcerated in jails or under supervision by jails, staff working for jails, average daily population.	Reported by jail officials	National	Adult or youth, race/ethnicity, sex, conviction status, severity of offense.	Length of confinement	Annual	1982
Vera Institute of Justice's Incarceration Trends	Vera Institute of Justice	U.S. jail population (ages 15-64)	Jail admissions, individuals incarcerated in jails, pretrial individuals incarcerated, individuals incarcerated in prison.	Reported by U.S. Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Statistics and independent research	National, state, county, region	Race/ethnicity, gender.	Jail capacity, urbanicity (rural, urban, suburban, etc.).	No publication schedule available. Last year of data available for states is 2022.	1970
Jail Data Initiative	NYU Public Safety Lab	U.S. jail population	Individuals incarcerated in jails, average daily population.	Reported by jail officials	National, state, county, city	Age, Race/ethnicity, gender, conviction status, bond/bail status, type of offense.	Length of confinement	No publication schedule available. Frequently updated.	2019

Appendix E: Data sources on conditions of confinement

Name of data source	Published by	Populations	Basic unit(s) of analysis	Type of data (self-reported, administrative, media reports, other)	Level(s) of data (National, state, county, city, etc.)	Demographic breakdowns offered	Special topics covered	Frequency of data publication	Earliest data easily accessible online
Census of Jails	BJS	U.S. jail and community supervision populations	Individuals incarcerated in jails or under supervision by jails, jails in a state or region, average daily population.	Reported by jail officials	National, state, region	Adult or youth, race/ethnicity, sex.	Drug and alcohol use, COVID-19 testing and infections.	Periodic. Last year of data available is 2013.	1970
Survey of Prison Inmates	BJS	U.S. prison population	Individuals incarcerated in state prisons.	Prison records combined with self-reports from incarcerated people	National	Age, race/ethnicity, sex, criminal histories, socioeconomic characteristics, family backgrounds, committing offense(s), sentence length.	Drug and alcohol treatment, mental and physical health treatment, institutional programs, rules violations.	Periodic. Last year of data available is 2016.	1974
National Inmate Survey	BJS	U.S. prison and jail populations	Individuals with substance abuse issues, individuals with mental health issues.	Self-reports from incarcerated people	National	Age, educational attainment, marital status, race/ethnicity, sex, conviction status, arrest frequency, type of offense.	Treatment type, sentence length, and time served.	Sporadic. Last year of data available is 2012.	2007
Mortality in Correctional Institutions	BJS	U.S. prison and jail populations	Deaths	Reported by prison and jail officials	National, state	Age, sex, race/ethnicity, committing offense(s), conviction status, medical status (pre-existing conditions).	Cause of death	Inactive. Last year of data available is 2017.	2000
Reuters Investigates' Dying Inside	Reuters	U.S. jail population (excluding Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Rhode Island, and Vermont)	Deaths	Reported by prison and jail officials through records requests, supplemented by independent research.	National, state, county	Age, race, custody status.	Cause of death	No publication schedule available. Last year of data available is 2019.	2008
Huffington Post's Jail Deaths Database	Huffington Post	U.S. jail population	Deaths	Publicly available data through news reports and records requests.	National, state	Age, sex, conviction status.	Cause of death, facility where death occurred.	Inactive. Last year of data available is 2016.	2015

Appendix F: Data sources on probation, parole, and reentry

Name of data source	Published by	Populations	Basic unit(s) of analysis	Type of data (self-reported, administrative, media reports, other)	Level(s) of data (National, state, county, city, etc.)	Demographic breakdowns offered	Special topics covered	Frequency of data publication	Earliest data easily accessible online
Annual Probation Survey and Annual Parole Survey	BJS	U.S. community supervision population	Adults on parole/probation	Reported by correctional agencies	National, state	Race/ethnicity, sex, supervision status, offense type, most serious offense.	Adults exiting from probation/parole by type (completion, incarceration, death, etc.), Adults entering probation/parole by type.	Annual	1980
Robina Institute's Profiles in Parole Release & Revocation	Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice	N/A	State profiles	Reported by correctional agencies	State	N/A	Length of probation sentences, risk assessment tools, international comparisons, ranking of release factors in order of importance.	Publication schedule unavailable. Last year of data available is 2019.	2013
Justice Center's Confined and Costly	Council of State Governments	N/A	Prison admissions for parole/probation violations, annual cost	Reported by correctional agencies	National, state	N/A	N/A	Publication schedule unavailable. Last year of data available is 2017.	2017
National Survey of Drug Use and Health Data Archive	U.S. Department of Health and Human Services	U.S. population	Mental health and substance abuse disorders	Self-reports from U.S. residents	National	N/A	Extensive list of cross-referenceable topics that include age of last drug use, drug use in past 12 months, number of times booked in a jail in past 12 months, and serious psychological stress in past 12 months.	Annual	1998
Recidivism of State Prisoners	BJS	Formerly incarcerated population	Adults re-arrested	Reported by correctional agencies and FBI	National	Age, race/ethnicity, sex, criminal history, most serious offense committed, type of admission or release.	Recidivism by year(s) after release.	Periodic. Last year of data available is 2012.	1983

Appendix G: Data sources on youth incarceration

Name of data source	Published by	Populations	Basic unit(s) of analysis	Type of data (self-reported, administrative, media reports, other)	Level(s) of data (National, state, county, city, etc.)	Demographic breakdowns offered	Special topics covered	Frequency of data publication	Earliest data easily accessible online
Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention's Statistical Briefing Book	Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency	Youth (under 18) population	Victimizations, youth arrested, youth in custody	Reported by government agency	National, state, county	Age, race/ethnicity, sex, committing offense, detention status.	Residential placement, court processes.	Publication schedule unavailable. Last year of data available is 2020.	1980
Burns Institute's United States of Disparity	Burns Institute	Youth (under 18) population	Victimizations, youth arrested, youth in custody	Reported by government agency	National, state, county	Race/ethnicity, sex, committing offense, detention status.	Juvenile justice decision points, reform efforts, state advisory groups.	Publication schedule unavailable. Last year of data available is 2017.	1997
Kids Count Data Center	Annie E. Casey Foundation	Youth (under 18) population	Youth in custody	Reported by government agency	National, state, county	N/A	N/A	Publication schedule unavailable. Last year of data available is 2021.	2001

Appendix H: Data sources on Native American incarceration

Name of data source	Published by	Populations	Basic unit(s) of analysis	Type of data (self-reported, administrative, media reports, other)	Level(s) of data (National, state, county, city, etc.)	Demographic breakdowns offered	Special topics covered	Frequency of data publication	Earliest data easily accessible online
Survey of Jails in Indian Country	BJS	Jail populations on tribal lands	Individuals incarcerated, deaths, staff working at jail, average daily population.	Reported by jail officials	National	Age, sex, conviction status, most serious offense.	Jail rated capacity, facility size, COVID-19, jail staff employment by job function.	Annual	1998

Appendix I: Data sources on immigrant incarceration

Name of data source	Published by	Populations	Basic unit(s) of analysis	Type of data (self-reported, administrative, media reports, other)	Level(s) of data (National, state, county, city, etc.)	Demographic breakdowns offered	Special topics covered	Frequency of data publication	Earliest data easily accessible online
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)	ICE	Immigrants	Immigrants detained, detention facilities, average daily population, court cases, removals.	Reported by ICE	National, state, city	Criminal legal status	Release types (bonded out, own recognizance), community supervision, length of stay, date of last facility inspection, facility types.	Updated monthly.	2018
Transparency Project	National Immigrant Justice Center	Immigrants	Immigrants detained, detention facilities, average daily population, removals, deaths in detention.	Reported by Department of Homeland Security through private legal action	National, state, city	Age, sex	Facility rating and date of last inspection, facility types.	Publication schedule unavailable. Last year of data available is 2017.	2007 for document requests. 2017 for facility counts.
TRAC Immigration Tools	Syracuse University	Immigrants	Arrests, removals, cases.	Reported by government agencies through private legal action	National, state, county	Age, time in U.S., family unit status (child or adult), marital status, citizenship, gender, entry status, custody status, criminal conviction.	Method of arrest, disposition, time in custody.	Publication schedule unavailable. Last year of data available is 2018 for enforcement data, 2019 for detention data, and 2021 for court data.	1998 for deportation proceedings. 2004 for removals. 2005 for arrests.

• Home
• About
• Publications
• Issues
• Data
• Blog
• Contact
• Careers
• Donate

Contact us online or write us: Instagram Twitter Facebook RSS

Donate