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The cost of incarceration

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Prison gerrymandering

COVID-19

Maryland has an incarceration rate of 531 per 100,000 people (including prisons, jails, immigration detention, and juvenile justice facilities), meaning that it locks up a higher percentage of its people than almost any democracy on earth. Read on to learn more about who is incarcerated in Maryland and why.

32,000 people from Maryland are behind bars

Additionally, the number of people impacted by county and city jails in Maryland is much larger than the graph above would suggest, because people cycle through local jails relatively quickly. Each year, at least 83,000 different people are booked into local jails in Maryland.

Using 2020 census data, we looked at where people in Maryland prisons come from. We found they come from all corners of the state, but disproportionately from Baltimore and some Eastern Shore communities.

Rates of imprisonment have grown dramatically in the last 40 years

Also see these Maryland graphs:

• total numbers rather than rates.
• Women’s prisons: Incarceration Rates | Total Population
• Men’s prisons: Incarceration Rates | Total Population

Today, Maryland’s incarceration rates stand out internationally

In the U.S., incarceration extends beyond prisons and local jails to include other systems of confinement. The U.S. and state incarceration rates in this graph include people held by these other parts of the justice system, so they may be slightly higher than the commonly reported incarceration rates that only include prisons and jails. Details on the data are available in States of Incarceration: The Global Context. We also have a version of this graph focusing on the incarceration of women.

People of color are overrepresented in prisons and jails

Maryland's criminal justice system is more than just its prisons and jails

The high cost of being incarcerated in Maryland

Prisons and jails in Maryland are increasingly shifting the cost of incarceration to people behind bars and their families, hiding the true economic costs of mass incarceration:

• Jails in Maryland charge up to $3.15 for a 15-minute phone call, reaping profits for companies, while prisons charge 48¢ for a 15-minute call.
• Maryland suspended its $2 medical copays in prisons at the beginning of the pandemic — it should end them completely.
• Maryland prisons and ViaPath don’t report data on fees to transfer money to an incarcerated loved one.
• People in Maryland prisons with more than $2 in their spending account must pay for basic hygiene products and writing supplies.
• People in Maryland prisons earn as little as 15¢ an hour for their work.

Our other articles about Maryland

• The parole board in Maryland is releasing 66% fewer people and holding 27% fewer hearings since the pandemic started
• Maryland's choice to criminalize "failure to appear" may be hurting public safety
• The cost of incarcerating older people is incredibly high, and their risk of reincarceration is incredibly low, yet 13% of people in Maryland prisons are over the age of 55. Why is the state keeping so many older people locked up?
• Maryland makes it difficult or even risky for incarcerated journalists to tell their stories.
• Maryland has one of nation’s highest rates of HIV in prison and legally criminalizes people with HIV.
• Bail companies in Maryland have a track record of avoiding accountability, our report All Profit, No Risk and review of state-by-state evidence show
• Maryland prisons release about 7,408 people every year
• Report: Where people in prison come from: The geography of mass incarceration in Maryland
• Maryland hinders jury diversity by excluding people with felony records and some prior misdemeanors
• We graded the parole release systems of all 50 states - Maryland gets a D
• Who's helping the 28,467 women released from Maryland correctional facilities each year?
• Maryland proposes - and promptly withdraws - plan to ban letters to people incarcerated in the state’s prisons

Other resources

• Research on Maryland in our Research Library

Prison-based gerrymandering in Maryland

• Maryland enacts law to count incarcerated people at their home addresses, ending prison gerrymandering across the state
• Implementing Reform: How Maryland & New York Ended Prison Gerrymandering
• Maryland law brings long-awaited racial justice to Somerset County
• Supreme Court upholds Maryland law ending prison-based gerrymandering; Huge victory for fair representation
• Importing Constituents: Incarcerated People and Political Clout in Maryland

Data on COVID-19 in Maryland jails and prisons

We gave Maryland a "D-" grade in September 2021 for its response to the coronavirus in prisons, noting that:

• Maryland was one of only 8 states that failed to reduce their prison population by more than 10% during the pandemic.
• One of the easiest ways to reduce prison populations — especially during a pandemic — is to suspend admissions to prisons for technical violations of probation and parole (which are not crimes). Yet most states, including Maryland, failed to utilize this simple tool of population reduction.

For more detail, see our report States of Emergency. Or check out these other resources:

• How many COVID-19 cases in Maryland communities can be linked to outbreaks in correctional facilities? (data from our report Mass Incarceration, COVID-19, and Community Spread)