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MORE VERMONT WOMEN ARE DOING TIME
MONTPELIER, VERMONT -- The increasing number of women in Vermont prisons mirrors national trends, experts say, fueled in large measure by more intensive substance abuse problems such as heroin and prescription drugs.
While there are no definitive studies to indicate why the Vermont female prison population is growing at such a rapid rate, Vermont Corrections Department officials, Vermont judges, and experts in the field say anecdotal evidence suggests that drugs -- especially heroin -- are playing a large role.
"This is not based on any scientific assessment but on repeated conversations with women offenders," said Vermont Corrections Commissioner Steven Gold. "The issue of heroin and the context of substance abuse plays a large role in the world of women offenders."
Last June there were 80 women in the Vermont prison system. This year that number has mushroomed to 140. From 1992, when the state of Vermont averaged about 28 women in prison at any one time, to 2002, when the state of Vermont averaged 92, the number has risen fairly steadily.
The administration of Vermont Gov. James Douglas is responding to the increase with a plan to convert the currently all-male Windsor prison's 100 beds to all women, giving Vermont its first true women's prison. Female prisoners are currently held at the co-ed facility in South Burlington, Vermont as well as an all-female Dale wing of the Vermont State Hospital in Waterbury.
Vermont Officials say an all-female prison will help create a better environment to provide treatment for substance abuse and other problems along with education and drug rehabilitation programs.
The growth in the number of Vermont women in prison follows a national pattern, according to Paige Harrison, a statistician with the Bureau of Justice Statistics in the U.S. Department of Justice.
According to a recently released BJS report, Vermont had 132 women in state or federal prisons last year. That was an increase of 39 percent from last year but still the third lowest in the country behind only Maine and North Dakota. A total of 97,491 women were incarcerated last year, with Texas' 13,051 far away the leader.
But Vermont has averaged an annual increase of 17 percent in the number of female prisoners since 1995, behind only North Dakota and Montana. And its incarceration rate -- the number of women imprisoned per 100,000 female residents -- has risen from six in 1995 to 26 in 2002. Nationally, the rate rose from 47 per 100,000 in 1995 to 60 last year.
Harrison cautioned against reading too much into the numbers, though.
"They are based on respective population," she said. "You are talking about a very small population, so fluctuations in that population are going to make a big difference in those rates, as well as the percentage growth."
And women are still far behind men in Vermont, Harrison noted, though they are catching up.
"( The women's population ) increased at a percentage at a faster rate even though the number of men outpaces women," Harrison said. "� Men are about 15 times more likely than women to be incarcerated in prison ( nationally )."
There's also some indication that more women are going to prison for violent offenses, Harrison said. She speculated that this may be in part due to some women accumulating longer criminal records and thus facing jail time for offenses that might have only earned probation before.
That's not the case in Vermont, according to state and federal officials.
Maureen Buell is a correctional program specialist with the National Institute of Corrections at the Department of Justice who worked in the Vermont Department of Corrections for nearly 30 years until 2001. She said drug-related offenses and theft or other crimes related to drugs were still the primary cause, as they are nationally.
She said Vermont female inmates are much like those nationally, other than the fact they tend to be more likely to have a high school diploma. Otherwise they are likely to have children ( 80 percent ); have multiple convictions ( 4.3 average ); have an alcohol problem ( 48 percent ) and/or a drug problem ( 38 percent ); have been sexually abused as a child ( 40 percent ); and physically abused as an adult ( 72 percent ).
They're also lower risks to the community and can be treated outside a prison, Buell said, something she complimented Vermont officials for doing. And while she praised the move to create an all-women's prison in Vermont, she said that more needed to be done to provide gender-specific treatment in the community.
"But it's a long haul," Buell said. "It's something that doesn't happen overnight."
She said the problem is too many women who are failing in treatment and ending up in prison.
"Women are coming back into the system at high rates for minor offenses; they're not coming in for new offenses. They need to be held accountable for their behaviors but there's also some systems issues here in terms of the availability of appropriate treatment � and other resources short of a jail bed," Buell said. "Make no mistake about it, there are some women who need to go back because they're out of control, but not at the numbers we're incarcerating nationally."
That's borne out by anecdotal evidence, according to Judge David Suntag, who's currently in Bennington District Court. Female offenders frequently come into court for minor drug or property offenses and don't go to jail but end up back in court.
"Maybe you start with a probationary term, trying to get them treatment, then something happens and they get arrested again," he said. "They come in on maybe not the most serious offenses. They get released on conditions and they end up violating those or they don't show up, and they get arrested and come in that way."
Eventually, some have to be put in prison to protect the community or to protect them from themselves, Suntag said.
"I think everybody, the state, the court, the defense is looking for a way to get this person into some form of treatment to solve their problem for the future, not just holding them for punishment," he said.
MONTPELIER, VERMONT -- The increasing number of women in Vermont prisons mirrors national trends, experts say, fueled in large measure by more intensive substance abuse problems such as heroin and prescription drugs.
While there are no definitive studies to indicate why the Vermont female prison population is growing at such a rapid rate, Vermont Corrections Department officials, Vermont judges, and experts in the field say anecdotal evidence suggests that drugs -- especially heroin -- are playing a large role.
"This is not based on any scientific assessment but on repeated conversations with women offenders," said Vermont Corrections Commissioner Steven Gold. "The issue of heroin and the context of substance abuse plays a large role in the world of women offenders."
Last June there were 80 women in the Vermont prison system. This year that number has mushroomed to 140. From 1992, when the state of Vermont averaged about 28 women in prison at any one time, to 2002, when the state of Vermont averaged 92, the number has risen fairly steadily.
The administration of Vermont Gov. James Douglas is responding to the increase with a plan to convert the currently all-male Windsor prison's 100 beds to all women, giving Vermont its first true women's prison. Female prisoners are currently held at the co-ed facility in South Burlington, Vermont as well as an all-female Dale wing of the Vermont State Hospital in Waterbury.
Vermont Officials say an all-female prison will help create a better environment to provide treatment for substance abuse and other problems along with education and drug rehabilitation programs.
The growth in the number of Vermont women in prison follows a national pattern, according to Paige Harrison, a statistician with the Bureau of Justice Statistics in the U.S. Department of Justice.
According to a recently released BJS report, Vermont had 132 women in state or federal prisons last year. That was an increase of 39 percent from last year but still the third lowest in the country behind only Maine and North Dakota. A total of 97,491 women were incarcerated last year, with Texas' 13,051 far away the leader.
But Vermont has averaged an annual increase of 17 percent in the number of female prisoners since 1995, behind only North Dakota and Montana. And its incarceration rate -- the number of women imprisoned per 100,000 female residents -- has risen from six in 1995 to 26 in 2002. Nationally, the rate rose from 47 per 100,000 in 1995 to 60 last year.
Harrison cautioned against reading too much into the numbers, though.
"They are based on respective population," she said. "You are talking about a very small population, so fluctuations in that population are going to make a big difference in those rates, as well as the percentage growth."
And women are still far behind men in Vermont, Harrison noted, though they are catching up.
"( The women's population ) increased at a percentage at a faster rate even though the number of men outpaces women," Harrison said. "� Men are about 15 times more likely than women to be incarcerated in prison ( nationally )."
There's also some indication that more women are going to prison for violent offenses, Harrison said. She speculated that this may be in part due to some women accumulating longer criminal records and thus facing jail time for offenses that might have only earned probation before.
That's not the case in Vermont, according to state and federal officials.
Maureen Buell is a correctional program specialist with the National Institute of Corrections at the Department of Justice who worked in the Vermont Department of Corrections for nearly 30 years until 2001. She said drug-related offenses and theft or other crimes related to drugs were still the primary cause, as they are nationally.
She said Vermont female inmates are much like those nationally, other than the fact they tend to be more likely to have a high school diploma. Otherwise they are likely to have children ( 80 percent ); have multiple convictions ( 4.3 average ); have an alcohol problem ( 48 percent ) and/or a drug problem ( 38 percent ); have been sexually abused as a child ( 40 percent ); and physically abused as an adult ( 72 percent ).
They're also lower risks to the community and can be treated outside a prison, Buell said, something she complimented Vermont officials for doing. And while she praised the move to create an all-women's prison in Vermont, she said that more needed to be done to provide gender-specific treatment in the community.
"But it's a long haul," Buell said. "It's something that doesn't happen overnight."
She said the problem is too many women who are failing in treatment and ending up in prison.
"Women are coming back into the system at high rates for minor offenses; they're not coming in for new offenses. They need to be held accountable for their behaviors but there's also some systems issues here in terms of the availability of appropriate treatment � and other resources short of a jail bed," Buell said. "Make no mistake about it, there are some women who need to go back because they're out of control, but not at the numbers we're incarcerating nationally."
That's borne out by anecdotal evidence, according to Judge David Suntag, who's currently in Bennington District Court. Female offenders frequently come into court for minor drug or property offenses and don't go to jail but end up back in court.
"Maybe you start with a probationary term, trying to get them treatment, then something happens and they get arrested again," he said. "They come in on maybe not the most serious offenses. They get released on conditions and they end up violating those or they don't show up, and they get arrested and come in that way."
Eventually, some have to be put in prison to protect the community or to protect them from themselves, Suntag said.
"I think everybody, the state, the court, the defense is looking for a way to get this person into some form of treatment to solve their problem for the future, not just holding them for punishment," he said.
