PREA Data Collection Activities, 2016, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics (2016)

This report from the U.S. Department of Justice provides the results from two surveys—the Survey of Sexual Victimization (SSV) and the National Survey of Youth in Custody (NSYC)—undertaken as required by the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA). A third survey, the National Inmate Survey (NIS), is to administer data  collection for its fourth edition in 2018-19.

The SSV is administered to a sample of at least 10% of all correctional facilities covered under PREA, which includes federal and state prison systems, as well as facilities operated by the U.S. military and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). However, it is unclear exactly how many facilities were surveyed. Findings from the SSV include:

·      There were 865 reported allegations of sexual victimization in juvenile correctional facilities in 2012, an increase from 735 in 2011 and 690 in 2010.

·      From 2007 to 2012, nearly 9,500 allegations of sexual victimization of youth were reported in state or local and private facilities. Fifty-five percent involved youth-on-youth sexual victimization and 45% involved staff-on-youth victimization.

The latest NSYC was conducted between February 2012 and September 2012. Findings from the most recent analysis of collected data include:

·      Lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) youth (10.4%) were more than seven times as likely as heterosexual youth (1.4%) to be assaulted by another youth.

·      Youth-on-youth sexual assault was most prevalent (4.5%) when facilities had a high concentration of youth with histories of sexual abuse, a concentration of LGB youth, and greater-than-average proportion of youth held for a violent sexual assault.

·      Youth-on-youth sexual assault was lowest in facilities (1.1%) when almost all youth in the facility reported that they first learned sexual assault was not allowed within the first 24 hours of arrival.