Half Of Virginia's Inmates Are African American

Mr. John Bennie Williams, 83 (second from left), is legally blind, has been in prison 40 years, and has been turned down for parole or geriatric release over 20 times

• African Americans are incarcerated in state prisons at a rate
that is 5.1 times the imprisonment of whites. In five states
(Iowa, Minnesota, New Jersey, Vermont, and Wisconsin),
the disparity is more than 10 to 1.

• In twelve states, more than half of the prison population
is black: Alabama, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana,
Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Jersey, North Carolina,
South Carolina, and Virginia. Maryland, whose prison
population is 72% African American, tops the nation.

• In eleven states, at least 1 in 20 adult black males is in prison.

• In Oklahoma, the state with the highest overall black
incarceration rate, 1 in 15 black males ages 18 and older is
in prison.

• States exhibit substantial variation in the range of racial
disparity, from a black/white ratio of 12.2:1 in New Jersey
to 2.4:1 in Hawaii.

Data courtesy of http://www.sentencingproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/The-Color-of-Justice-Racial-and-Ethnic-Disparity-in-State-Prisons.pdf