January 1, 1999    NCJ 172849

Presents national-level statistics describing all aspects of processing in the Federal criminal justice system, including investigations by U.S. attorneys, prosecutions and declinations, pretrial release and detention, convictions and acquittals, sentencing, appeals, and corrections for 1996.

Case processing data for 1996 by Federal district are available in spreadsheet format in the Crime & Justice Electronic Data Abstracts.

Interactive tabulations of Federal criminal case processing data are available from the Federal Justice Statistics Resource Center.

Highlights include the following:

• During 1996 U.S. attorneys initiated criminal investigations of 97,776 suspects. They concluded investigations of 98,454 suspects.
• Criminal charges were filed in U.S. district courts against 65,480 defendants during 1996. Criminal cases were concluded against 61,434 defendants during 1996. Eighty-six percent (or 53,076) of all defendants were convicted. Most felony convictions were obtained by guilty plea (91%).
• Drug defendants comprised 41% of felony convictions; defendants charged with property and public-order offenses comprised 26% and 27%, respectively, of the felony convictions; and defendants charged with violent offenses comprised the remaining 6% of felony convictions.

Part of the Compendium of Federal Justice Statistics Series

Full Report (PDF 564K)
Full Report - No tables (ASCII file 174K)
Introduction (PDF 98K)
Chapter 1: Prosecution (PDF 110K)
Chapter 1: Prosecution - 5 Spreadsheets (Zip format 17K)
Chapter 2: Pretrial release (PDF 145K)
Chapter 2: Pretrial release - 10 Spreadsheets (Zip format 38K)
Chapter 3: Adjudication (PDF 104K)
Chapter 3: Adjudication - 5 Spreadsheets (Zip format 19K)
Chapter 4: Sentencing (PDF 110K)
Chapter 4: Sentencing - 6 Spreadsheets (Zip format 24K)
Chapter 5: Appeals (PDF 99K)
Chapter 5: Appeals - 5 Spreadsheets (Zip format 20K)
Chapter 6: Corrections (PDF 177K)
Chapter 6: Corrections - 13 Spreadsheets (Zip format 55K)
Methodology (PDF 134K)
Codebooks and Datasets

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