Prison overcrowding or typically, mass incarceration, is the most threatening issue in virtually every state and in many municipalities all over U.S.. It has been reported that the imprisonment rate in U.S. is seven times as much as in Europe and it is equivalently increasing with the increase in population. Inmate populations are escalating due to a great number of sentencing to jails and prisons and the number of repeat

This view stresses a sociological approach to crime, suggesting that the behavior of criminals is more easily adapted and changed when law enforcement agents understand the circumstances and immediate environment an offender lives in that may contribute to offensive behaviors, and to one's behavioral characteristics. Literature Review The purpose of the preliminary literature presented is to provide an overview of the historical foundations leading to prison overcrowding, an exploration of the populations

'" Two steps if taken, however, would almost halve our prison population. First, repeal state laws that now mandate the incarceration of drug offenders and develop instead many more public and private treatment centers to which nonviolent drug abusers can be referred. Second, stop using jails or prisons to house the mentally ill. Tougher sentencing is being justified, in part, by the widespread belief that incarceration is the chief reason violent crime

The need for less restrictive parole policies could help relieve prison overcrowding (Kunselman & Johnson, 2004). According to Hughes (2007), "On any given day, a large number of the admissions to America's prisons come from individuals who have failed to comply with the conditions of their parole or probation supervision. For years, the revocation and incarceration rate of probationers and parolees has had a significant impact on the growth of

At the very least, many prisons have a justified reputation as themselves being violent places where the concentration of criminal personalities will tend to stimulate higher levels of gang affiliation, internal drug trade and abuse, and, in general, absorption in a culture where criminality is normal. The result is that many who enter young, with limited criminal experience or with more modest criminal proclivities may be exposed to the kinds

Prison overcrowding is indeed a grave problem that many states face. It is a phenomenon that both the international and national parties have faced for decades (Howard,1996). Overcrowded correction facilities may lead to the failures of programs in the prisons, violations of civil rights and also violence between inmates. Prison overcrowding may develop as a result of steady, regular, continuous increase and enlargement of prisoners which then develops to what