Growing State Prison Population Cannot Be Solely Explained by Changes in Crime Population or Economic Distress.

The number of inmates in the New Hampshire state prison system increased 560% in twenty-five years, from 394 inmates in 1982 to 2,615 in 2007.  Factors commonly associated with increases in a state’s prison population fail to explain the extraordinary rise in the number of New Hampshire state prison inmates.  As shown in the table below, New Hampshire’s resident population, number of people living in poverty, and number of violent crimes have not increased as fast as the number of inmates held in New Hampshire’s state prisons.  In fact, while the number of state prison inmates increased almost six times from 1982 to 2007, the number of property crimes and the number of arrests for all crimes in New Hampshire actually declined.