De-Segregating Arizona’s Prisons

• In Event: State Prisons & Legal Change

Abstract

For many years Arizona prison officials purposefully segregated their prison by not allowing prisoners of different races and ethnicities to be celled with one another. Certain work assignments were also segregated, as were the dining halls and recreation yards. In 2011, one prisoner (Stephen Rudisill) challenged these practices in court which resulted in a Stipulated Agreement whereby Arizona agreed to desegregate its entire prison system between 2016 and 2021. The author of this article was appointed by the Court to monitor the so called Integration Housing Plan (IHP). What follows is an assessment of how IHP effectively desegregated the prison system without an increase in prison violence. In making that assessment a statistical model was developed that measured the level of segregation by housing units and program/work assignments. The policy and research methodological implications of the Arizona initiative are discussed.

Author

• James Austin, JFA Institute