Women Committed to the Massachusetts Department of Correction, 1970 to 1980

• NCJ Number: 82720
• Author(s): L K Holt
• Date Published: 1980
• Length: 56 pages
• Corporate Author: Massachusetts Dept of Correction
• Sale Source: National Institute of Justice/
• Publication Type: Statistics
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

The report describes women committed to the Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Framingham during the period 1970 to 1980 in terms of their offenses at arrest, personal backgrounds, and criminal history.

Abstract

From 1970 to 1974, there was a decrease in the number of women committed to Framingham. From 1974-80, there has been a steady annual increase in the number of commitments. This increase is mainly due to the commitment of women with county sentences to a Department of Correction facility. Property offenses were the most common type of offense committed by these women, followed by public order offenses and offenses against persons. The median age at incarceration was 24 years. Of the women committed, 58 percent were white, 40 percent black, and 2 percent Hispanic. Most were single, almost half had some drug use history, and most had some history of unemployment. The correctional system must devise programs and procedures for this new influx of short-term female inmates. Tables and four references are appended.