Florida Department of Corrections Releases
2000-2001 Annual Report

Do you know that it costs $49.75 a day to keep an inmate in prison in Florida? Have you ever wondered how many offenders are in prison on drug charges? Want to know how many women are serving time? These questions and more are answered in the 2000-2001 Annual Report now available on the Department of Corrections web site at www.dc.state.fl.us.

The report is the comprehensive guide to the Florida prison system. It contains information, data and statistics on inmates, institutions, programs, costs and issues. “Under the leadership of Governor Jeb Bush, Florida is tougher on crime than at any time in our history,” said Secretary Michael W. Moore. “The report clearly shows that inmates are serving a much greater percentage of their sentence,” he said.

“As a cost saving to taxpayers, we are distributing our annual report via the Internet,” said Moore. “It is convenient and far less expensive than publishing a bound document. Individuals and organizations can print pages that are relevant to them,” he added.

Also posted on the web are video clips of the department’s victim services staff talking about the assistance offered to victims of crime this year. “We also included short film clips of correctional officers and probation officers to give the public a better sense of the job they do,” said Secretary Moore. “We believe our officers walk the toughest beat in the state.” The recently released Fiscal Year 2000-01 Annual Report for the Florida Department of Corrections contains some surprising statistics. Among those you might not expect:

TIME SERVED INCREASES

Inmates continue to serve more of their court-imposed sentences (see Graph A). The average percentage of sentence served by the 26,805 inmates released from prison in FY 2000-01 was 82.1%. By comparison, in June 1997 the average percentage of sentence served before release was 71.2%, and it was 43.1% in June 1994. (Please note that not all inmates released in this and previous years were sentenced under the 85% law now if effect).

COST PER INMATE

It costs $49.75 a day or $18,159 a year to incarcerate and care for an inmate in a major correctional institution (prison) in FY 2000-01, 30 cents less than it cost the previous year.

NO PERIMETER ESCAPES

There were no escapes from the secure perimeter of a prison in Florida in FY 2000-01.

COMMUNITY CORRECTIONS

The majority (68.1%) of those admitted to community supervision in FY 2000-01 is 2.4 years, compared to 2.5 years in FY 1995-96.

SENTENCE LENGTHS EQUAL FOR BLACKS AND WHITES

For the past two fiscal years (FY 1999-00 and FY 2000-01), the average sentence lengths of whites and blacks have been equal, and the four years previous to that, whites received longer sentences than blacks, on average.

NUMBER OF YOUNG INMATES DECLINES

The number of inmates who are 17 or younger continues to decline, from 669 in 1997 to 395 in 2001, a decrease of 41%. In 1997, inmates 17 and younger made up 1.4% of the total population, and only 0.6% in 2001.

NUMBER OF OLDER INMATES INCREASES

Conversely, the number of inmates ages 50 and older continues to climb, from 4,176 in 1997 to 6,172 in 2001, an increase of 48%. Older inmates comprised 6.4% of the population in 1997, compared to 8.2% in 2001.

EXECUTION STATISTICS

There were three executions in FY 2000-01. A total of 51 inmates have been executed in Florida since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. The majority of those 51 were white (32 or 62.8%), 17 were black (33.3%) and two were of other races. They served an average of 11.3 years before execution, and the average number of years between offense and execution was 12.7.

Annual Reports dating to 1995 are available on the web site under “statistics and publications.” DOC will provide a hard copy of pages if an individual or organization has no access to the Internet. Copies may be requested by calling the public affairs office at (850) 488-0420.