Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
7 Figures: How long do criminals spend in prison?
7 Figures: How long do criminals spend in prison?
Apr 30, 2025 2:38 PM

As the old saying goes, “If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime.” But how much time do you have to do if mit a crime? Probably not as long as you’d imagine.

The Bureau of Justice Statistics recently released a report—Time Served in State Prison 2016—that reveals how long prisoners serve for a variety of criminal offenses. Here are seven figures from the report you should know:

1. The average time served by state prisoners released in 2016, from initial admission to initial release, was 2.6 years, and the median time served was 1.3 years.

2. Criminals served an average of 46 percent of their maximum sentence length before their initial release. State prisoners initially released in 2016 served an average of 62 percent of their sentence if they were serving time for rape or sexual assault, and 38 percent if serving time for drug possession. Persons serving less than one year in state prison represented 40 percent of first releases in 2016.

3. Persons sentenced for murder or non-negligent manslaughter served an average of 15 years in state prison before their initial release.

4. Ninety-six percent of violent offenders released in 2016, including 70 percent of those sentenced for murder or non-negligent manslaughter, served less than 20 years before initial release from state prison. About three-quarters of violent offenders released from state prison in 2016 served at least one year before initial release.

5. Roughly 1 in 5 state prisoners released in 2016 after being sentenced for rape or sexual assault served 10 or more years before initial release.

6. On average, state prisoners serving time for property, drug, or public-order offenses served less than two years before initial release. Most offenders (59 percent) released from state prison in 2016 after serving time for drug possession served less than one year before their initial release.

7. By offense type, the median time served was 13.4 years for murder, 2.2 years for violent crimes excluding murder, 17 months for drug trafficking, and 10 months for drug possession.

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
Explainer: What you should know about the Constitution Party platform
Note: This is the fifthin a series examining the positions of several minorparty and independent presidential candidates onissues covered by the Acton Institute. A previous series covered the Democratic Party platform (see here and here) and the Republican Party Platform (see here and here). Although minor parties—often called “third parties” to distinguish them from the dominant two—have always been a part of American politics, the dissatisfaction with the Republican and Democratic parties in the current election season has led some...
The financial mess of the Vatican
The finances of the Catholic Church, and more specifically of the Vatican, are quite the mess. When Pope Francis was elected, he recognized this problem and appointed Australian Cardinal George Pell as the inaugural Prefect of the Secretariat of the Economy. Cardinal Pell was given the authority and the task to clean up the finances of the Vatican, something that has been an issue since the mid-1970s. But now reports are surfacing that Pell is losing his authority to make...
Orthodox Theology, Morality, and Impersonal Markets
Today at Public Orthodoxy, the blog of the Orthodox Christian Studies Center of Fordham University, I have an essay on the need for Orthodox theology to more seriously engage modern economic science. The argument would likely apply in some degree to other theological traditions as well. I write, Personal relationships and the monastic life have different norms than impersonal markets. This does not mean that markets have no norms, nor that the norms of markets should overrule any other concerns....
When will the whole world have universal access to basic education?
Education—even at the most basic levels—not only makes poor countries richer, it also saves lives. For example, if sub-Saharan Africa were achieving universal lower secondary education for women by 2030, it would prevent up to 3.5 million child deaths from 2050-2060. Achieving universal upper pletion across the globe by that date would also prevent up to 50,000 disaster-related deaths per decade by 2040-2050. And by universalising upper secondary education in low e countries, the world could increase per capita earnings...
The idea equation for economic growth
The key to creating economic flourishing is economic growth and the key to creating long-term economic growth is to create new ideas. But whatis the key to creating ideas that lead to innovation? EconomistAlex Tabarrok says the idea equation goes like this:Ideas = Population x Incentives x Ideas/per hour This equation is a useful way to lay out the factors affecting idea production, says Tabarrok in the video below. When we understand the factors behind production, then we can better...
‘For God and Profit’ Review: Christianity is pro-profit and pro-property
Benedikt Koehler, writing for Reaction, recently reviewed Samuel Gregg’s latest, For God and Profit. Koehler is an author whose books and articles focus on the history of economic thought. He starts the review by offering some background on why Gregg’s book is so important, citing events like the financial crisis of 2008 and some of Pope Francis’ critiques of capitalism. Then Koehler begins to dig into some of the details of Gregg’s book: The es in two halves. The first...
Hunger in America is on the decline
In policy and social science hunger is defined as a condition in which a person, for a sustained period, is unable to eat sufficient food to meet basic nutritional needs. While the vast majority of people who suffer from hunger live in developing countries, far too many people in America also suffer from hunger. Determining how many are affected, though, is made more difficult because we do not have an exact way to identify who lacks food. mon proxy is...
Mike Rowe interviews Charles Koch on work, cronyism, and criminal justice reform
Mike Rowe was recently criticized for his new partnership with Charles Koch, CEO of Koch Industries, whose philanthropy for conservative and libertarian causes routinely garners controversy, despite its tremendous fruits. Rowe, himself an increasingly provocative figure, recently interviewed Koch on their core areas of collaboration, including work, the trades, cronyism, higher education, and criminal justice reform. Koch on the politicization of “work ethic”: Unless you learn to work by the time you’re in your 30s, you’re never that productive. So...
Rise of the ‘super-neo-reverse Malthusians’
The doom delusions of central planners and population “experts” are well documented and refuted, ranging fromthe early pessimism of the Rev. Thomas Robert Malthustothe morefanatical predictions of Paul Ehrlich. Through these lenses,population growth is a driver of poverty, following from a framing of the human person asa strain and a drain on society and the environment. As Michael Mattheson Miller has written, such thinking suffers from a zero-sum mindset wherein the economy (or any web of human relationships) is a...
Justice, Torah and the Minimum Wage
This question of whether government should mandate a higher minimum wage is not a new one, says Curt Biren in this week’s Acton Commentary. In fact, es up in ancient Jewish texts — related to property rights, labor law and charity law: Economists have studied the idea, but they often disagree on its impact. Some can cite statistics that purportedly show that there is no marked decline in employment. Others have data to prove that the imposition of higher minimum...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved