The original content of Democracy Now! Headlines appears under the Creative
Commons BY-NC-ND 3.0 License (United States). For more, including their other
shows and media, visit www.democracynow.org.
March 19, 2009

Study: Latinos Largest Ethnic Group in US Prisons
-------------------------------------------------



A new study says Latinos now constitute the largest ethnic group in
federal prisons. Mark Hugo Lopez of the Pew Hispanic Center says Latinos
account for 40 percent of prisoners nationwide.

Mark Hugo Lopez: “Between 1991 and 2007, the share of all sentenced
federal offenders who are Hispanic has risen from about 24 percent in
1991 to 40 percent in 2007. So they’ve really almost doubled their share
of all sentenced federal offenders. Also, Hispanics represent the single
largest group of all sentenced federal offenders. The 40 percent share
Hispanic is larger than the white share at 27 percent and the black
share at 23 percent in 2007.”

Nearly half of the Latin prison population has been jailed on
immigration charges, followed closely by drug charges.



.