Texas Prison Bid'ness

According to research by our allies at the Private Corrections Institute, as of May, 2007, eight private prison corporations were operating over 47,000 prison beds in Texas. These include lock-ups operated by private prison corporations that are serving as:

• Local county jails
• Prisons holding Texans under Texas Department of Criminal Justice contracts
• Prisons holding people under contracts from other state systems
• Prisons holding people under contract with the Federal Bureau of Prisons
• Pretrial detention centers under contract with the US Marshals Service
  
• Immigration detention centers under contract with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency
• Youth prisons
• Pre-release or halfway houses
• Prisons holding people under contracts from a mix of local, state or federal agencies.

The map does not include lockups that are publicly run (by the state, county, or federal government) or any lockups run by nonprofits.

You can mouse over any dot on the map to see which private prison(s) the dot represents. Each of the eight corporations has its own color on the map:

Are you surprised by what you see? Do you think this is a good idea? Think we missed any private for-profit prisons? Let us know by leaving a comment below.