Graph 22 Sentenced prisoners, by average sentence length (a) - 30 June 2005

Table 39

Deaths in custody

	Police		Prison		Total (a)
	Indigenous	Non-Indigenous	Indigenous	Non-Indigenous	Indigenous	Non-Indigenous	Total
1990	5	26	5	28	10	55	65
1991	5	26	8	31	13	57	70
1992	7	24	2	34	9	58	67
1993	3	28	7	42	10	71	81
1994	3	24	11	42	14	67	81
1995	4	22	17	42	21	66	87
1996	6	23	12	40	18	64	82
1997	6	23	9	67	15	90	105
1998	6	19	9	60	16	79	95
1999	6	20	13	46	19	66	85
2000	5	20	11	53	17	74	91
2001	5	26	14	42	19	68	87
2002	6	13	8	42	14	55	69
2003	7	26	10	25	17	51	68
2004	7	21	7	32	14	53	67

(a) Includes deaths that occurred in custody other than police or prison custody (such as juvenile detention).

127. During the period 1990-2002, the majority of deaths (65 per cent) occurred in prison custody, while 34 per cent were in police custody - 18 per cent of all deaths in prison custody were of Indigenous prisoners. During this period, the proportion of the prison population that was Indigenous rose from 14 per cent to 20 per cent. In 1995 the crude death rate of Indigenous prisoners was more than twice that of non-Indigenous prisoners (5.7 and 2.4 respectively). However, in 2002, both the Indigenous and the non-Indigenous death rates were 3.1 per 1,000 prisoners. The death rate of non-Indigenous prisoners was higher than that of Indigenous prisoners in 1992, 1997 and 1998.

Graph 23

Prison custody death rates (a)

The death penalty

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