UCLA LAW

Behind Bars
Data Project

Over two million people are held in American carceral facilities, facing an outsized risk of death. But we know relatively little about who is in greatest danger and why. The UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project works to increase transparency and accountability within the US carceral system through data compilation and research. Our aim is to deepen public knowledge and understanding of all forms of deaths in custody by providing free, accessible data, support for researchers, and our own analyses.

4,813

annual* deaths in all U.S. prisons

380annual* deaths in all federal prisons

4,433annual* deaths in all state prisons

* Data from 45 states and all federal prisons in 2024. Only partial data available for Louisiana and Texas in 2024. See our blog post for more details on the data.

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Crude Mortality Rate per 10,000

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Our project has built a centralized, public, online data repository documenting deaths in custody nationwide. These deaths have never been reported in one place and, in some cases, have never been reported at all. Our data includes general death data for all American prison systems from 2015-2024, detailed, individual-level data for most prison systems (47 of 51) from 2019-2024, and some data for 133 jail systems post 2019.

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