Female arrests, incarceration on the rise, DOJ report shows News
Female arrests, incarceration on the rise, DOJ report shows

[JURIST] The number of women incarcerated in state and federal prisons in 2004 was up by four percent compared with the year before, with women making up seven percent of all inmates, according to a report [PDF text] issued Sunday by the US DOJ Bureau of Justice Statistics. The increase in female incarcerations is more than double the 1.8 percent for their male counterparts. According to an author of the report, the upswing can be linked to the increased participation of women in drug crimes, violent crimes and fraud, though the Sentencing Project [advocacy website] says that the increase is due in large part to sentencing policies in the war on drugs. According to FBI figures [text], there were more arrests made for drug violations in 2004 than any other offense and those sentenced on drug-related offenses made up of 55 percent of all federal inmates in 2003. The Sentencing Project said US policy makers would be wise to consider alternatives to both current sentencing and drug policies. The Justice Policy Institute [advocacy website] said that the statistics do not show a relationship between prison population growth and the crime rate which has fallen in recent years. AP has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, murdered by Henry II's knights

On December 29, 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral by knights acting in the name of Henry II.

Becket and Henry had been entangled in a power struggle over, among other things, criminal jurisdiction over clergy. Read a contemporary account of the murder of Thomas Becket.

Texas attains US statehood

On December 29, 1845, Texas became the twenty-eighth state to join the United States of America when US President James K. Polk signed the Ordinance of Annexation. Texas had a complicated path to statehood because it had formerly been part of Mexico and then an independent republic. The US Congress passed the Annexation of the Republic of Texas Joint Resolution on March 1, 1845. Voters in Texas then approved the Ordinance of Annexation in October, before it was approved by the US Congress and signed into law by President Polk on this day in 1845. The US Supreme Court later ruled in Texas v. White that, despite its unique path to statehood, Texas did not have the right to secede from the union.