Senior Citizens Behind Bars: Challenges for the Criminal Justice System

Within two decades if not sooner at least one in three prisoners in the US will be a senior citizen. Our prisons, however, were designed for a much younger population. Senior Citizens Behind Bars critically explores the unique set of challenges that older prisoners pose for the criminal justice system.

Examining the lack of fit between the needs of older inmates and the correctional policies and practices that govern efforts to meet those needs, the authors confront such tough issues as health care, inmate victimization, and end-of-life care. Their rigorous, evidence-based analysis of both problems and solutions is a seminal contribution carefully designed for scholars and practitioners alike.