People in prison are exposed to and experience sexual violence inside prisons, further exposing them to communicable diseases and trauma. The consequences of sexual violence follow the individual into the community upon release. This paper estimates the prevalence of sexual victimization within a state prison system. A total of 6,964 men and 564 women participated in a survey administered using audio-CASI. Weighted estimates of prevalence were constructed by gender and facility size. Rates of sexual victimization varied significantly by gender, age, perpetrator, question wording, and facility. Rates of inmate-on-inmate sexual victimization in the previous 6 months were highest for female inmates (212 per 1,000), more than four times higher than male rates (43 per 1,000). Abusive sexual conduct was more likely between inmates and between staff and inmates than nonconsensual sexual acts. Sexual violence inside prison is an urgent public health issue needing targeted interventions to prevent and ameliorate its health and social consequences, which spatially concentrate in poor inner-city areas where these individuals ultimately return.

This study estimates prevalence rates of inmate-on-inmate and staff-on-inmate physical victimization. Inmate subjects were drawn from 13 adult male prisons and 1 female prison operated by a single mid-Atlantic state. A total of 7,221 men and 564 women participated. Rates of physical victimization varied significantly by gender, perpetrator, question wording, and facility. Prevalence rates of inmate-on-inmate physical violence in the previous 6 months were equal for males (205 per 1,000) and females (206 incidents per 1,000). Males had higher rates of physical violence perpetrated by staff (246 per 1,000 vs. 83 per 1,000). By facility, inmate-on-inmate prevalence rates ranged from 129 to 346 per 1,000, while the range for staff-on-inmate was 83 to 321 per 1,000.

BACKGROUND: Little is known about the nature of community police interactions with older adults. This is a major gap in our knowledge as police are potential "first responders" to a variety of emergent criminal, legal, social, and medical problems faced by this population, yet previous studies have focused primarily on domestic elder abuse. SPECIFIC AIMS: To estimate the prevalence of police department contact in an observational cohort of community dwelling older people and to determine the role of the older person in such contact. Secondary aims were to determine the distribution of crime types experienced by cohort members and to identify factors at cohort inception that were associated with police contact. SUBJECTS: Members of the New Haven EPESE cohort (Established Population for Epidemiologic Studies in the Elderly) who were alive in 1985 (n = 2,321), an observational cohort of community-dwelling older adults who had regular standardized evaluations of medical, functional, and psychosocial health. TYPE OF STUDY: Observational Cohort. METHODS: Police records in same catchment area of the cohort were searched to determine if cohort members had any interaction with police over the follow-up period 1985-1995; those cohort members who had such interactions had detailed abstraction of police records to determine the nature of the event(s) which were then linked to cohort records so that health and criminal justice records could be analyzed concordantly. RESULTS: The sampling adjusted prevalence of police contact was 29% over an eleven year follow-up period with 684 members of the 2,321 subject cohort experiencing a total of 1,651 separate contacts. The most common context in which cohort members interacted with police was solely as a victim of an alleged crime (57.5 of subjects, sampling adjusted, 62.1% of contacts), but subjects also had substantial interactions with police as complainants, witnesses, and perpetrators of crime. Violent crimes accounted for 21% of the contacts in which subjects were victims. Three factors at cohort inception were independently associated with being victimized over the follow-up period in multivariable analysis: being ADL dependent (OR .42, 95% CI .22-.80), being African American (OR 1.48, 95% CI 1.01-2.18), and being a younger cohort member (OR for age .94 per year, 95% CI .91-1.02). Gender was not significantly associated with victimization. CONCLUSIONS: Older adults have substantial interaction with community police in a variety of contexts, but primarily as victims of crime. ADL impairment and older age actually conferred a decreased risk of victimization in this study, defying the stereotype of victimized elders as the frail "oldest old." However, the extremely high prevalence of police interaction with older adults suggests that health and criminal justice policy makers need to consider this population in law enforcement manpower planning and training.