People in Jail and Prison in 2020

Vera Institute of Justice researchers collected data on the number of people in local jails and state and federal prisons at both midyear and fall 2020 to provide timely information on how incarceration is changing in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic. Researchers estimated the national jail population using a sample of 1,558 jail jurisdictions and the national prison population based on a sample of 49 states and the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Vera also collected data on people incarcerated and detained by the U.S. Marshals Service (USMS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).