Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 117.djvu/991

 117 STAT. 972

PUBLIC LAW 108–79—SEPT. 4, 2003

Public Law 108–79 108th Congress An Act Sept. 4, 2003 [S. 1435]

Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003. 45 USC 15601 note.

To provide for the analysis of the incidence and effects of prison rape in Federal, State, and local institutions and to provide information, resources, recommendations, and funding to protect individuals from prison rape.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, SECTION 1.SHORT TITLE; TABLE OF CONTENTS.

(a) SHORT TITLE.—This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003’’. (b) TABLE OF CONTENTS.—The table of contents of this Act is as follows: Sec. Sec. Sec. Sec. Sec. Sec. Sec. Sec. Sec. Sec.

42 USC 15601.

1. Short title; table of contents. 2. Findings. 3. Purposes. 4. National prison rape statistics, data, and research. 5. Prison rape prevention and prosecution. 6. Grants to protect inmates and safeguard communities. 7. National Prison Rape Reduction Commission. 8. Adoption and effect of national standards. 9. Requirement that accreditation organizations adopt accreditation standards. 10. Definitions.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

Congress makes the following findings: (1) 2,100,146 persons were incarcerated in the United States at the end of 2001: 1,324,465 in Federal and State prisons and 631,240 in county and local jails. In 1999, there were more than 10,000,000 separate admissions to and discharges from prisons and jails. (2) Insufficient research has been conducted and insufficient data reported on the extent of prison rape. However, experts have conservatively estimated that at least 13 percent of the inmates in the United States have been sexually assaulted in prison. Many inmates have suffered repeated assaults. Under this estimate, nearly 200,000 inmates now incarcerated have been or will be the victims of prison rape. The total number of inmates who have been sexually assaulted in the past 20 years likely exceeds 1,000,000. (3) Inmates with mental illness are at increased risk of sexual victimization. America’s jails and prisons house more mentally ill individuals than all of the Nation’s psychiatric hospitals combined. As many as 16 percent of inmates in State prisons and jails, and 7 percent of Federal inmates, suffer from mental illness. (4) Young first-time offenders are at increased risk of sexual victimization. Juveniles are 5 times more likely to be sexually

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