The federal prison population is now at 193,299.
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At the peak in 2013, privately operated prisons held approximately 15% or 30,000 inmates.
The U.S. Department of Justice’s decision will not affect the for-profit prison companies’ relationships with other federal agencies or state clients.
The directive, however, only applies to federal prisons, not state ones.
In the memo, private prison “served an important role for a period of time but have shown that they compare poorly to federal prison facilities”.
Thursday, the United States Department of Justice Announced that they plan to start phasing out the use of privately-owned and contracted prisons. Another 24% are located in facilities owned by state and local governments that exclusively house immigrants for ICE. The move would cut back the countrys reliance on privately run prisons until they are out of service, the Washington Post reports. “This is the right step forward”. The federal prison population has been declining due to changes in sentencing policies over the past three years, reducing the need for private prisons.
“And I think it’s recognition that when we are talking about depriving people of their liberty, we shouldn’t be turning that decision over to a private entity – that’s not what we should be doing in a democracy”, said Mauer.
A 2015 report from the Center for American Progress found that previous year, 62 percent of all beds in DHS facilities are under the control of private companies.
The private prisons are operated by three private companies – Corrections Corporation of America, GEO Group Inc., and Management and Training Corp. Both companies rely on BOP contracts for large parts of their revenue.
The department says as each private prison contract reaches the end of its term, they will mostly not be renewed. About 22,660 federal inmates resided in those private prisons in December, according to last weeks Inspector General report.
The Justice Department began contracting with private prisons after the federal prison population increased by 800 percent between 1980 and 2013.
Grassroots Leadership points out that, “most privately operated prisons within the BOP are Criminal Alien Requirement (CAR) prisons”.
Prison-reform advocates hailed the new policy. “Lives have been lost to this broken system”. Vehicle prisons hold noncitizens, many of whom have been criminally prosecuted for crossing the border. Previously, officials with the civil immigration system handled such cases, according to the legal organization’s report.
That means the controversial Northwest Detention Center, a roughly 1500-bed jail run by the GEO Group in Tacoma, will continue operating for the foreseeable future.
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The Bureau of Prisons houses about 193,000 inmates.
