Drug use among the adult arrestee population continued to be considerably higher and, at least for males, to increase. Between 1991 and 1995, the number of adults under correctional supervision increased 18 percent, to 5.4 million. The number of individuals imprisoned for drug offenses and serious property and violent offenses increased 36 percent. In 1995, two-thirds of sentenced prisoners entering prison were new court commitments, and nearly a third were parole and other conditional release violators. Between 1991 and 1995, nearly 1,500 new prisoners under sentence of death were received by state and federal prisons, and 170 prisoners were executed.
Children are more than twice as likely as the general population to be victims of violent crime.
The number of juvenile inmates in adult correctional facilities increased 47 percent between 1990 and 1995. Courts are looking to various types of specialized courts in order to move current caseloads and limit future caseloads. In addition, the report contains many statistics about the impact of crime and criminal justice on minorities and case processing, and about the media's response to crime.