FY2006 Prison Rape Elimination Act Grant Program

The Protecting Inmates and Safeguarding Communities Discretionary Grant Program was created as a result of the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (the Act), Public Law 108-79. The goal of the Act is to eradicate sexual assaults in all of the correctional facilities in this country, be they federal, state, or local in nature. Nevertheless, the statutory focus for this grant program is state and local correctional facilities. This program is divided into two parts: (1) Protecting Inmates and (2) Safeguarding Communities. The Protecting Inmates part focuses on providing funding to state and local agencies for the costs of personnel, training, technical assistance, and data collection in the areas of prevention, investigation, prosecution, and treatment of victims of inmate on inmate sexual assault in a correctional facility. The Safeguarding Communities component of the program focuses on assisting the states in developing and implementing strategies when making release decisions for sexual aggressors without compromising public safety and addressing the needs of the victims after release.

The Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs (ADECA) Law Enforcement and Traffic Safety Division (LETS Division),and the Alabama Department of Corrections will use these grant funds to gain a greater understanding of the incidence rate of sexual assault and greatly improve the current system dealing with rape and coerced sexual contact. The Alabama Department of Correction will implement the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) Program FY2006. The goals and objectives of the program include 1) implement the program in 3-4 pilot correctional facilities in the first year of the 2-year project period. 2) Implementation of the rape prevention program in 100% of the ADOC's correctional facilities in the second year of the 2-year project period. 3) To select and train 9 regional program coordinators to implement and monitor the program's activities. 4) To conduct program-specific training to ADOC's newly-hired correctional officers on prison rape/prevention. 5) To maintain an incidence rate of confirmed prisoner-on-prisoner rape/sexual assault and/or staff-on-prisoner rape/sexual assault for ADOC's prison system.

CA/NCF