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16 Just. Rsch. & Pol'y 3 (2015)

handle is hein.journals/jcerhadp16 and id is 1 raw text is: Guest Editorial Justice Research and Policy 2015, Vol. 16(1) 3-7 Intr ducton t theSpecal The Author(s) 2015 Introduction to the Special Reprints and permission: sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav Issue on Corrections DOI: 10.1177/1525107115603954 jrx.sagepub.com OSAGE This special issue of Justice Research and Policy contains invited articles on correc- tions, with a special emphasis on new research that may provide readers with a greater understanding of correctional practice, trends, and outcomes. The growth in the nation's prison population has given rise to an explosion in research studies and related advocacy for reform, which are often without distinguishable boundaries. This explosion in research and advocacy has made it difficult for policymakers, practitioners, and the gen- eral public to separate research that is data driven from research that is policy driven. The articles in this issue are data driven, with emphasis on new data and explora- tion of relationships that have to date not been well explored. The authors, a collection of government statisticians and private-sector and university-based researchers, have explored topics that have important implications for policy and practice. Although each of the studies contains a discussion of policy implications, some discussions are more explicit than others and some are more nuanced than others. Ultimately, it is up to the readers to decide their value. As a guest editor, my role has been to seek clarity, and thereby gain a better under- standing of current correctional practices, trends, and outcomes. And so, before you are five studies that (1) explore the complexities confronting women working in correc- tions; (2) examine the impact of time served in prison on the likelihood of reoffending; (3) compare mortality rates among males in state prisons with rates in the U.S. resident populations by demographic subgroup and cause of death; (4) provide detail on changes in the federal response to sex offending, subsequent growth in numbers held in prison, and implications for their management prior to release; and (5) assess the impact of sen- tencing reforms on growth in the elderly inmate populations over the past three decades. I have spent the last decade or more doing data collections and analyses that were mandated by the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (PREA). These efforts have relied on administrative records that federal, state, and local correctional authorities maintain as part of their facility operations and on reports of victims identified in large-scale national surveys of adults in prisons and jails and youth in state- operated facilities. The subsequent reports have measured the magnitude of the problem of sexual violence and have provided detail on the circumstances surrounding victimization. In the process, we have learned a great deal about the complexity of sexual victimization, in particular that it varies in degree of coercion and severity. When Congress unanimously passed PREA, there was no mention of staff sexual mis- conduct. However, there has emerged from the subsequent research strong evidence that not only is staff sexual misconduct extensive but that female staff members are disproportionately involved.

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