Elderly In Prisons

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The population of the elderly in prison between the years 2007 and 2010, the number of state and federal prisoners at the age of 65 or older grew 94 times faster than the overall prison population. The population of elderly in prison between 1981 and 2010, the number of state and federal prisoners at age 55 and over grew from 8,853 to 124,900. By the year 2030, that number is projected to grow to 400,000, an increase of 4,400 percent from 1981. By the time a person turns 50, the possibility of that person committing another crime has dropped by a lot. 16.9 percent of prisoners that are released at age 45 and older return for new sentences. One challenge the elderly face in prison is that the elderly are oftentimes physically frail and vulnerable. …show more content…
Elderly face several mental obstacles trying to deal with new rules and a different foreign culture. All of the prisoners must adjust to their new prison life, but elderly prisoners are more suspected of feeling depressed, overwhelmed, and in other situations, suicidal. As prisoners get older, and new, elderly inmates are incarcerated, new programs should be developed to meet the needs. The inmates do not get out of their cell because they lose the ability to walk, and they might need help from the staff while the staff is helping someone else. The estimates are that locking up an older inmate costs three times as much as a younger one. Some of the older inmates are blind, some have cancer, and some have serious mental illness. Mostly all elderly inmates are old due to how long their sentence is and few of them will never get out alive. The annual cost of care for an elderly inmate is about $68,270, and the highest annual cost is $102,405.in 1988, the United States spent about $11 billion on the corrections …show more content…
The interviews consisted of 25 new elderly offenders, with a mean age of 68 years. Some of the variables assessed in the study include personal background, family life, criminal activities, physical health, and strategies for coping with prison life. It was found that the new elderly offender's reaction to incarceration was often depression, thoughts of suicide, and a fear of dying in prison. The findings from this research show that prison programs should be expanded to accommodate the needs of the elderly in prison. As the US confronts a growing population of geriatric prisoners, it is time to reconsider whether they really need to be locked up. Prison keeps dangerous people off the streets. But how many prisoners whose minds and bodies have been whittled away by age are dangerous? (Fellner). Of 1,511 prisoners the age of 65 and older when released between 1995 and 2008, only 8 of those prisoners were returned to prison for committing a violent felony. Among the released older prisoners were 469 who had originally been sent to prison because of a violent
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