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Maine has an incarceration rate of 328 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 Maine and why.

Jump to COVID-19 data.

5,000 people from Maine are behind bars

Additionally, the number of people impacted by county and city jails in Maine is much larger than the graph above would suggest, because people cycle through local jails relatively quickly. Each year, at least 14,000 different people are booked into local jails in Maine.

Rates of imprisonment have grown dramatically in the last 40 years

Also see these Maine graphs:

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

Today, Maine’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

See also our detailed graphs about Whites, Blacks, and American Indians/Native Americans in Maine prisons and jails.

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

Data on COVID-19 in Maine jails and prisons

We gave Maine a failing grade in September 2021 for its response to the coronavirus in prisons, noting that Maine failed to utilize one of the most obvious, and easiest, tools for reducing the prison population — stopping prison admissions for technical violations of probation and parole (which are not crimes).

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

• Our Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic page tracks criminal justice policy responses to the coronavirus all 50 states
• Prisons are COVID-19 hotspots, but as of mid-May, only 43% of people in Maine prisons had gotten a vaccine
• As of August 2020, Maine prisons were not even requiring staff to wear masks at work
• We're tracking Maine's medical copay policies in prisons during the pandemic
• State prison and jail population data for May, August, September, and December 2020 (data availability varies by state)

Our other articles about Maine

• How much do incarcerated people in Maine earn for their work in prison?
• Maine prisons charge a $5 copay to incarcerated people, putting health at risk
• New data: Low incomes - but high fees - for people on probation in Maine
• We graded the parole release systems of all 50 states - Maine gets an F-
• Who's helping the 5,581 women released from Maine correctional facilities each year?
• The hidden costs in Maine's "no-cost" prison tablet contract
• Prison-based gerrymandering costs Maine 8th graders local schooling
• Phantom Constituents in Maine’s Regional School Unit 13: How the Census Bureau’s outdated method of counting prisoners harms democracy

Other resources

• Research on Maine in our Research Library