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Confronting Prison Rape
By Wendy McElroy

A bright light is about to be shone on an almost unseen social problem: prison rape. ...

According to Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), on December 31, 2002, there were 2,033,331 people incarcerated in the United States. (Approximately 7% of those in State and Federal prisons are female.)

The US prison population is rising. In 1980, there were just over half a million inmates. The BJS estimates that, "If incarceration rates remain unchanged, 6.6% of U.S. residents born in 2001 will go to prison during their lifetime." (Other sources place that figure higher.) The chances are that someone you personally know -- and, perhaps, care about -- will become a prisoner.

Estimates on the rate of prison rape vary. In 2001, Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a comprehensive report that estimated between 250,000 to and 600,000 prisoners, overwhelmingly male, are raped each year....

...And, yet, the question remains "why should you care?"

One reason: prisoners are human beings. Approximately half of those imprisoned today are "non-violent". Many have been arrested on drug charges or for comparatively minor offenses, such as being behind in child support payments.

The young and "unhardened" prisoners are the most vulnerable to rape. Consider Rodney Hulin. Arrested at 16 for setting fire to a dumpster, Hulin received an eight-year sentence. After being repeatedly raped and dismissed by prison authorities, he killed himself.

Most victims survive. But as Rep. Robert C. Scott (D-Va.) comments, "They leave prison much more likely to engage in crime than when they went in." Barrett Duke -- a VP of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission that lobbied for the Prison Rape Elimination Act -- adds, "The sexual brutalization of inmates exposes men and women to punishment that is not only cruel but that also severely impedes their opportunity to rehabilitate themselves to assume lives worthy of the dignity of their humanity."

More than dignity is involved. In 2000, about 25,000 inmates had HIV. The HIV rate in prison is at least four times that of the general public. A similar situation exists with other communicable diseases, like Hepatitis C (HCV), which can be spread through anal sex and has become the most common blood-borne infection in the U.S. According to the National Institute of Justice and the National Commission on Correctional Health Care, the rate of HCV infection in inmates is 9-10 times higher than in the general public.

You should care about prison rape if only for one reason: approximately 630,000 inmates were released from prison in 2002 and became the people beside whom you may now be living and working....