What role do jails play in American corrections? What are some of the issues that jail admin-istrators currently face?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

• In contrast to prisons, which are long-term confinement facilities designed to hold those who have been sentenced to serve time for committing crime, jails are short-term confinement facilities whose traditional purpose has been to hold those awaiting trial or sentencing. Inmates who have been tried and sentenced may also be held at jails until their transfer to a prison facility, and today's jails sometimes hold inmates serving short sentences of confinement. Jails have been called the "shame of the criminal justice system," many being old, poorly funded, and scantily staffed by underpaid employees. Recently, the emergence of direct-supervision jails seems to have reduced the incidence of jail violence and improved the conditions of jailed inmates in jurisdictions where such facilities operate. In direct-supervision jails, the traditional barriers between inmates and staff have been mostly eliminated.