A jail is defined as a confinement facility for people held in lawful custody, that are under the jurisdiction of a local government. The purpose of jails is to receive and hold individuals that are waiting for trial, or to hold inmates that have already been sentenced.
In the United States, many of the different state´s jails are over capacity in their population. This is a direct consequence of the growth of delinquency in the country, having 1 over 200 citizens behind bars. The growth of jails has been referred to as the "shame of the criminal justice system" due to the poor conditions in which most of these jails are in. Also, the staff that works in these jails is underpaid and not properly trained for their job. This situation is a result of the low priority that the jail system has when it comes to distributing the local budget.
