DES MOINES, Iowa — A report released by the Iowa Department of Corrections says prison releases and admissions for the state "declined sharply" in the fiscal year 2021 "due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the responsive measures by the Department of Corrections."
The single-page report, which is embedded at the bottom of this article, says 7,744 people were incarcerated in Iowa's prison system as of June 14, 2021.
That's the second-lowest the population has been in the past decade, second only to last fiscal year.
The report says 3,199 prison inmates were released during the time of the report while 3,251 were admitted.
The DOC says it worked with the Iowa Board of Parole and the eight Community-Based Corrections Districts "to transition as many inmates as possible to community supervision to reduce the overpopulation in the institutions" during the height of COVID.
In addition, the time to process an inmate into a prison from county jails increased, resulting in higher county jail populations and lower populations in the prisons.
The report also breaks down prison admissions by type of offense. For both FY 2020 and 2021, property offenses brought in the most prisoners, followed by violent offenses and then drug offenses.
Reasons for prison releases are also listed. The report says deaths accounted for 1.1% of prisoner releases in FY 2021 and 0.3% in FY 2020. The average rate of deaths from FY 2011-2019 was also 0.3%.
According to Local 5' records on prisoner deaths from COVID, 19 prisoners died from the virus in FY 2021.
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Read the report below: