Federally sentenced men and women in custody: 2013 to 2018

Research Highlights: Federal in-custody population trend lines over five years show a steady decline for men and a rise for women.

Population forecasts and the monitoring of trends for federal in-custody counts are routinely conducted by the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC). ^{Footnote 1} An examination of breaks in trend lines can help to signal when net demand for capacity to accommodate and deliver interventions might be rising, falling or being met.

Historical year-end federal in-custody counts are recorded as standardized reports in CSC’s Corporate Reporting System-Modernized (CRS-M). Data between year-end 2013 and 2018 was extracted for federally sentenced men and women from CRS-M to establish 5-year trend lines.

Since peaking in 2013 at 14,650, the federal men in-custody population has steadily declined to 13,219 (-1,431 or -9.8%) by year-end 2018. As displayed in the figure below, there were several notable breaks in the 5-year trend line, the significant decline below in 2016 followed by a rise above in 2018. The latter trend break may be a signaling a dampening of the decline.

Men In-custody

On the other hand, the federal women in-custody population has steadily increased from 621 in 2013 by +93 (or +15%) to 714 in 2018. As displayed in the figure, there is a notable break in the 5-year trend line with the rise above beginning in 2014 through to 2017.

Women In-custody

The longer-term downward trend-line for men is reflective of better preparation for release, more offenders granted an earlier discretionary release and improved results while on conditional release. However, the longer-term upward trend-line for women suggests that the current approach to criminal justice may require some further reflection.

Please e-mail the Research Branch or contact us by phone at (613) 995-3975.

You can also visit the Research Publications section for a full list of reports and one-page summaries.

Prepared by: Larry Motiuk