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jail data

jail scrapers

About once every hour, a python script scrapes the online jail dockets for 12 separate county jails in Mississippi. New intake sheets are uploaded to documentcloud.org, and the raw data is programatically entered into an Airtable base. The scripts also keep track of how long people are listed on the jail dockets to calculate approximate lengths of incarceration.

As of August, 2020, the only publicly provided data are calculated admissions and population trends.

Once the data is 100% cleaned and the incarcerated arrestees are anonymized to a degree that I'm comfortable with, I'll post a lot more of the data (e.g., charge(s), bond, arresting agency). If you are a journalist, activist, or civil rights attorney interested in the data, email or DM me.

For more details, see the github repo.

available jail data

The Vera Institute has shared historical jail data for each of Mississippi's 82 counties. The NYU Public Safety Lab tracks the daily jail population for more than a dozen MS counties. The MacArthur Justice Center at Ole Miss files records requests for snapshots of jail populations in all 82 counties. The table below links to the data from each of these sources per county.

county Vera NYU PSL MJC bfeldman89
adams
alcorn - -
amite - -
attala - -
benton - -
bolivar - -
calhoun -
carroll - -
chickasaw - -
choctaw - -
claiborne - -
clarke - -
clay
coahoma - -
copiah - -
covington - -
desoto -
forrest - -
franklin - -
george - -
greene - -
grenada - -
hancock - -
harrison - -
hinds
holmes - -
humphreys - -
issaquena - -
itawamba - -
jackson
jasper
jeff davis - -
jefferson - -
jones
kemper
lafayette - -
lamar -
lauderdale - -
lawrence - -
leake - -
lee
leflore - -
lincoln - -
lowndes - -
madison
marion -
marshall - -
monroe - -
montgomery - -
neshoba - -
newton - -
noxubee - -
oktibbeha - -
panola - -
pearl river -
perry -
pike - -
pontotoc - -
prentiss - -
quitman - -
rankin - -
scott - -
sharkey - -
simpson - -
smith - -
stone - -
sunflower -
tallahatchie - -
tate - -
tippah - -
tishomingo - -
tunica
union - -
walthall - -
warren - -
washington - -
wayne - -
webster - -
wilkinson - -
winston - -
yalobusha - -
yazoo -