ALJAZEERA: Allegations of rape and sexual assault involving prison inmates are increasing, and nearly half of those assaults are committed against prisoners by correctional officers, according to a new report issued by the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics…
Among the substantiated staff-on-inmate cases in 2011, 54 percent were committed by women, the report said. From 2009 to 2011, 84 percent of the substantiated staff-on-inmate cases involved a sexual relationship with a female staff member that “appeared to be willing,” compared to 37 percent of the cases involving male staff members during the same time period. The report noted, however, that regardless of whether the sexual relationship between an inmate and a correctional officer was consensual, it was illegal…
Women prisoners appeared to experience disproportionate numbers of sexual assaults; while they represented 7 percent of state and federal prison inmates from 2009 to 2001, 22 percent of inmate-on-inmate cases involved women, as they did among 33 percent of staff-on-inmate incidents… (more)
