Exemplars of Success:
Implementing PREA in a New Era for America's Jails
Robert W. Dumond, Hayden P. Smith, PhD, and Frank V. Ferdik, PhD
When most people think about American jails, they picture overcrowded, chaotic facilities where little good can happen. Those misperceptions are even more pronounced when it comes to sexual violence. Popular culture and media tropes routinely reduce jail rape to a grim punchline—the ever-present predatory “don’t drop the soap” narrative—and, implicitly or explicitly, suggest that sexual victimization is a form of deserved punishment that somehow remedies social ills rather than a profound human-rights violation (see also Smith & Dunton, 2024). In reality, adequately implementing the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) and ensuring sexual safety in American jails is complicated by deep structural challenges, even as hopeful and promising practices have emerged in many facilities. Over the last several decades, the nation’s jails have also become the front-line mental health system, housing many of our most medically and psychologically vulnerable citizens while struggling with preventable deaths, including suicide (English, Heil, & Dumond, 2010).
At the same time, a quiet but significant shift is underway. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics’ Jails Report Series: 2024 Preliminary Data Release, local jails reported 7.9 million admissions between July 1, 2023, and June 30, 2024—31 percent fewer than ten years earlier, when there were 11.5 million admissions nationwide (Bureau of Justice Statistics [BJS], 2024). This substantial decline will not, by itself, solve the long-standing health and safety problems in our jails, which still admit millions of people each year. However, it does create a crucial opening: an opportunity to move from simply managing sheer numbers to deliberately creating safer, more humane environments, especially with respect to sexual safety and PREA implementation.
PREA establishes a clear expectation for all confinement settings: zero tolerance for sexual abuse and sexual harassment. Implementing PREA in local jails, however, is especially challenging. Rapid turnover means people may be in custody for only hours or days, leaving staff very little time to screen for vulnerability, classify, and house individuals safely, and provide information about sexual safety and reporting options. At the same time, decades of research have documented the “transinstitutionalization” of persons with mental illness from traditional psychiatric care into jails and prisons, so that jails now hold large numbers of people with serious mental illness, substance-use disorders, and extensive histories of trauma (English et al., 2010). These individuals are more vulnerable to sexual abuse and more likely to experience severe psychological effects if they are victimized. Suicide has remained a leading cause of death in American jails, and high rates of self-harm and mental health crisis illustrate how thin the margin of safety can be for many incarcerated people (Smith, 2015). Early analyses of PREA emphasized that the law could only be effective if corrections systems were willing to confront long-ignored patterns of sexual violence and strengthen data collection, accountability, and victim services (Dumond, 2003, 2006).
Physical conditions and system design add further complexity. Jails range from small, rural facilities with only a few dozen beds to “mega jails” with thousands of inmates. Some are newly built with direct supervision and good sight lines; others are decades old, with blind spots, crowding, and limited space for confidential services. Administrative structures vary as well: most jails are run by elected sheriffs, but others are managed by cities, counties, regional authorities, or, in unified systems, state corrections departments. Shifting leadership and tight budgets often leave jails under-resourced, with limited staff training and few dedicated programs. These realities make PREA implementation demanding work—but they do not make it impossible.
In fact, there is now a substantial body of experience showing that jails can meaningfully prevent and address sexual violence. A National Institute of Justice–funded study identified a set of “promising practices” that consistently appeared in jails, making real progress on PREA (English et al., 2010). That work underpins the following section, which is reproduced here in full because it continues to offer a clear, practical framework for agencies seeking to improve. This growing literature, including both conceptual and empirical assessments of PREA implementation (e.g., Dumond, 2003, 2006; Smith, 2020; Smith, Ferdik, Dunton, & Bolaji, 2023; Dunton, Smith, & Ferdik, 2024), reinforces the importance of leadership, staff training, organizational culture, and stakeholder buy-in in achieving meaningful change.
Promising Practices
Despite what may appear as daunting challenges, there are an equal number of promising practices that a number of US jails have made in implementing strategic, evidence-based interventions and keeping inmates safe. In the Final Report submitted to the National Institute of Justice, English, Heil, and Dumond (2010) identified eleven promising practices in responding to prisoner sexual violence in jails, including:
1. Leaders who promote values that advance safety, dignity, and respect for all residents, inmates, and staff;
2. Officials who actively seek better ways to manage the population and who integrate knowledge and ideas from a wide variety of sources, including staff, professional associations, accreditation processes, and other agencies and facilities;
3. Open communication between managers and correctional staff, and between correctional staff, inmates, and residents;
4. Recruitment and hiring of diverse individuals who are respectful towards others and have effective communication skills, and mentoring and succession planning;
5. Standardized and ongoing staff training to transmit values through policies and practices;
6. Direct supervision architecture and direct supervision principles for the behavior management of residents and inmates;
"Reduced admissions can ease crowding and staffing pressures, making it easier to move people for safety, provide confidential health and mental health services, and maintain consistent supervision in housing units."
7. Programs and services to (a) productively occupy the time of inmates, (b) meet the needs of prisoners and juveniles, and (c) improve the life outcomes of those who are incarcerated;
8. An objective classification system used to facilitate safety for inmates and staff;
9. A comprehensive and independent investigation process that emphasizes the following: (a) training security investigation and medical staff in responding appropriately to victims, (b) effective investigation techniques, (c) promotes cross-training, (d) responding immediately to all reports of sexual assault, (e) investigating all incidents of sexual assault, (f) sensitively responding to victims; and (g) prosecuting criminal behavior when appropriate;
10. A system of data collection, analysis, and incident tracking that enables effective, data-driven decision making; and
11. Officials who are committed to (a) learning from litigation, (b) detecting and correcting mistakes, and (c) transparency.
Several notable examples are worthy of further examination. The remainder of this article looks closely at these facilities, highlighting how they brought promising practices to life in everyday operations and became exemplars of PREA implementation and sexual safety.
Notable Exemplars of PREA Implementation in Jails
San Francisco County Jail (California)
The San Francisco County Jail system operates several jails and an intake and release center with a combined population of roughly 1,957 inmates. It has been a national leader in addressing sexual violence in custody since 1980. This success is largely rooted in the long tenure of Sheriff Michael Hennessey, J.D. (1980–2012), an innovative jail leader and early adopter of direct supervision, AIDS/HIV education, and one of the earliest sexual assault service-delivery flow charts and crisis-intervention protocols for incarcerated survivors—well before PREA was enacted. San Francisco’s progress came from using these innovations to change daily operations, not just policy language. Direct supervision allowed staff to interact with people in custody continuously, identify risk early, and respond quickly to safety concerns. By partnering with outside experts, integrating PREA-consistent principles into training and supervision, and using data to guide decisions, San Francisco built a culture in which sexual safety and respect became part of professional identity rather than an external requirement.
Barnwell County Detention Center (South Carolina)
Barnwell County Detention Center is a small, rural jail with a 106-bed capacity. Its PREA work shows how a small facility can compensate for limited in-house resources through strategic partnerships. Barnwell collaborated with the Cumbee Center to Assist Abused Persons to create access to confidential outside support for incarcerated survivors and partnered with the South Carolina Victim Assistance Network to establish a Sexual Assault Response Team (SART) tailored to the jail’s size and rural location. Leadership did not try to build everything internally; instead, they reached out to community providers, negotiated clear memoranda of understanding that spelled out roles and responsibilities, and integrated these partners into policy, training, and incident response. Staff are trained to make immediate referrals to advocates, medical services, and investigators, and SART protocols standardize how allegations are handled from the first report through hospital accompaniment and follow-up support. By relying on external expertise and embedding it in daily practice, Barnwell operationalized several of the eleven promising practices—leadership, partnership, victim-centered response, and data-informed improvement—within a very small jail environment.
Bexar County Adult Detention Center (Texas)
The Bexar County Adult Detention Center in San Antonio is a large “mega jail” with a capacity for about 4,600 inmates. It became an exemplar by treating PREA as a shared project with community partners rather than a purely internal compliance exercise. The jail worked with the Rape Crisis Center of San Antonio to develop a comprehensive memorandum of understanding that covers direct victim care, coordinated SART response, and cross-training between corrections staff and advocates. Administrators recognized that outside advocates had specialized expertise in trauma-informed care that the jail needed. They created formal agreements to guarantee 24/7 access to confidential crisis services, clarify how advocates would be notified of assaults, and set expectations for communication during investigations. Cross-training exposed advocates to jail operations and helped custody staff understand advocacy roles and confidentiality protections. Over time, these structures reduced confusion, improved victim trust, and ensured that allegations of sexual abuse triggered predictable, well-coordinated responses—exactly the kind of system PREA envisions.
West Virginia Regional Jail and Correctional Facility Authority (West Virginia)
The West Virginia Regional Jail and Correctional Facility Authority operates large regional jails serving multiple counties; one such facility in Salem has a bed capacity of 809 inmates. Early in 2014, the Authority entered a partnership with the West Virginia Foundation for Rape Information and Services (FRIS) to provide confidential crisis and emotional support services to incarcerated survivors, including hospital accompaniment. Working with FRIS, the Authority developed standardized procedures so that every facility knew how to contact advocates, coordinate SART response, and ensure that survivors had ongoing support. A case study by Just Detention International highlights how careful planning, mutual trust, and clear communication transformed a system in which victims had been isolated and fearful into one where they had credible avenues for help. The Authority’s willingness to share data, participate in joint trainings, and adjust practices based on feedback offers a concrete example of using PREA as a driver for continuous, system-wide improvement.
Miami-Dade County Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (Florida)
Miami-Dade operates one of the nation’s largest jail systems, usually housing around 4,700 inmates at any given time. In 2011, the department partnered with Just Detention International to establish the Miami-Dade Inmate Safety Project, a trauma-informed initiative focused on preventing sexual assault, building a culture of safety, and improving services for victims. The road to success in Miami-Dade ran through culture change. Working with JDI, the department conducted a system-wide assessment of policies, reporting mechanisms, and staff practices, then built a multi-year plan to align operations with PREA’s zero-tolerance standard. Training emphasized trauma, professional boundaries, and respectful communication; supervisors were coached to reinforce expectations in everyday operations. One especially important innovation was giving inmates confidential personal identification numbers to call a local rape crisis hotline directly, without going through staff. This practical step reduced fear of retaliation, increased reporting, and signaled that the department was serious about safety. Miami-Dade’s experience illustrates how a large system can move beyond checklist compliance to embed PREA into its core identity as a corrections agency.
Colorado Jails PREA Demonstration Project (Colorado)
The Colorado Jails PREA Demonstration Project brought together Pitkin County Jail in Aspen—a very small facility with a 14-bed capacity—and Lincoln County Jail in Hugo, a medium-sized facility with 216 beds—in partnership with Just Detention International and the Colorado Division of Criminal Justice. The project was designed explicitly to address the needs and constraints of smaller jails. The project team developed model PREA-compliant policies, staff-training curricula, and coordinated response protocols that assume minimal staffing and rural geography. The resulting PREA Staff Training Template for Small Jails gives sheriffs and jail administrators a ready-made curriculum that can be adapted to local conditions without requiring a large training division. Pitkin County is also proceeding with a multimillion-dollar overhaul of its physical plant, demonstrating how leadership used PREA and the demonstration project findings to advocate for modern design that supports direct supervision and safety. Together, Pitkin and Lincoln show that when smaller jails have tailored tools and strong external partners, they can meet PREA standards as effectively as much larger systems.
These examples provide clear evidence that successful interventions can be established in every type of jail facility—regardless of size, population, administration, or geography—and that a commitment to dignity, safety, security, and treatment can be realized in practice.
A Moment of Opportunity
The 31 percent decline in jail admissions over the past decade provides a unique—if fragile—opportunity to accelerate this kind of progress (BJS, 2024), even as the ongoing national staffing crisis and the lingering operational and behavioral-health impacts of COVID-19 make it challenging for many jails to fully capitalize on that opening. Reduced admissions can ease crowding and staffing pressures, making it easier to move people for safety, provide confidential health and mental health services, and maintain consistent supervision in housing units. Lower volumes allow for deeper engagement with each person in custody, including more thorough PREA-compliant screening and classification, better identification of mental health and substance-use needs, and clearer communication about rights and reporting options.
Just as importantly, the decline in admissions strengthens the argument for reinvesting savings into safety and treatment. If communities are relying less on jail for lower-level offenses—through diversion, pretrial reform, or community-based treatment—then resources once dedicated solely to managing high intake numbers can be redirected into infrastructure improvements, staff training, and robust victim services. For administrators and policymakers, this is the moment to modernize aging facilities, invest in direct-supervision housing, expand partnerships with rape crisis centers and mental health providers, and fully integrate PREA’s requirements into everyday operations. Recent empirical research on PREA highlights that the law’s success depends on whether both staff and incarcerated people understand, support, and effectively enforce its provisions, and that its implementation can produce complex effects on institutional climate, including some unintended—though overwhelmingly positive—consequences (Smith, 2020; Smith et al., 2023; Smith & Dunton, 2024; Dunton et al., 2024).
Every jail in America, regardless of size, location, or governance, can take concrete steps toward becoming an exemplar of PREA implementation and sexual safety. Clarifying institutional values, mapping out the existing response to sexual abuse, strengthening community partnerships, investing in high-quality training and supervision, and using data for continuous improvement are realistic starting points. PREA demands a zero-tolerance standard, coupled with staff training, victim services, prevention efforts, reporting mechanisms, investigation and prosecution, and data collection and reporting, which, if properly adhered to, will advance the safety and security of all those who live and work in jails.
PREA’s promise is ambitious: to eliminate sexual abuse in confinement settings. The experiences of the jails described here show that this goal is not utopian but is being pursued every day in real facilities with real constraints, by leaders and line staff committed to safety and dignity for all. With admissions declining and public attention focused on humane treatment, the question facing the field is no longer whether PREA can be implemented successfully in jails. The question is whether we will choose to follow the lead of those facilities that have already shown the way
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Robert W. Dumond, LCMHC, Diplomate, Clinical Forensic Counseling, is a clinical and forensic mental health counselor and national consultant on the prevention of sexual violence in confinement. He has worked extensively with jails, prisons, and community agencies on PREA implementation, suicide prevention, and trauma-informed practices. Contact: rwdumond@aol.com
Hayden P. Smith, PhD, is a Professor in the Department of Criminology & Criminal Justice at the University of South Carolina. His work focuses on use of force, restraint chairs, PREA, mental illness in corrections, suicide and self-injurious behavior, officer wellness, and standards of care. He regularly consults with correctional agencies on evidence-based practices, training, and policy development, and serves as an expert witness in legal cases involving correctional systems. Contact: SmithHP@mailbox.sc.edu
Frank V. Ferdik, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at Austin Peay State University. His research focuses on correctional officer wellness, jail administration, staff–administrator relationships, and health outcomes in correctional settings. He frequently collaborates with correctional agencies to improve evidence-based practices and training initiatives. Dr. Ferdik also presents research findings to practitioners and policymakers to inform policy development and enhance correctional standards. Contact: ferdikf@apsu.edu
References
Bureau of Justice Statistics. (2024). Jails report series: 2024 preliminary data release. U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs.
Dumond, R. W. (2003). Confronting America’s most ignored crime problem: The Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003. Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 31, 354–360.
Dumond, R. W. (2006). The impact of prisoner sexual violence: Challenges of implementing Public Law 108-79, the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003. Journal of Legislation, 32, 142–158.
Dunton, C. A., Smith, H. P., & Ferdik, F. (2024). The unintended effects of the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) in a maximum-security prison for women: Weaponization, bullying, and compulsory heterosexuality. Crime & Delinquency. Advance online publication.
English, K., Heil, P., & Dumond, R. W. (2010). Sexual assault in jail and juvenile facilities: Promising practices for prevention and response (Final report to the National Institute of Justice).
Smith, H.P. (2015). The meaning of the cut: A phenomenological inquiry into prisoner self‑injury. Justice Quarterly, 32, 500‑531.
Smith, H. P. (2020). Evaluating the implementation of the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA): A “lessons learned” approach. Evaluation and Program Planning, 83, 101855.
Smith, H. P., & Dunton, C. A. (2024). The Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA): Snitching, sexuality, and normalizing deviance. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 68(8), 849–866.
Smith, H. P., Ferdik, F., Dunton, C., & Bolaji, Q. (2023). An assessment of the knowledge, support, and behavior surrounding the implementation of the Prison Rape Elimination Act. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 50(7), 1016–1034.