HELP US END MASS INCARCERATION The Prison Policy Initiative uses research, advocacy, and organizing to dismantle mass incarceration. We’ve been in this movement for 23 years, thanks to individual donors like you.

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Where People in Prison Come From: The geography of mass incarceration

report logo What communities do people who are incarcerated come from? It's a simple question, with huge implications, that until recently was impossible to answer. However, unique data sets finally allow us to answer that question.

We partnered with organizations in each of these states to collect this data, and we're making it available to advocates, researchers, organizers, journalists, and others. Our hope is that they'll use it to better understand how mass incarceration harms communities and correlates with other measures of community well-being.

You can find our national overview report here. And below you'll find our state-specific reports that provide analysis of the geography of mass incarceration in each state and the datasets behind that analysis.



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