Prison suicide numbers

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution used death certificates, information from the Georgia Department of Corrections and other records to identify 125 Georgia inmate deaths since Jan. 1, 2017, as suicides.

The data show how suicides spiked since the end of 2018, when the prison system’s suicide rate already was among the nation’s highest.

In 2017, there were 19 suicides, and there were 17 in 2018, when the Department of Corrections said it was adding a psychologist to focus on suicide prevention. Yet in 2019, 25 inmates took their own lives, and 30 died by suicide in 2020. Last year, when the prison population shrunk due to COVID-19 pandemic measures, 25 died by suicide.

At least nine suicides were reported in the first three months of this year, putting the state on a pace that could exceed last year’s figure.

The last time Georgia’s prison suicide rate could be accurately compared to the rest of the country’s was 2019, when the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics issued its most recent report. That year, the national average was 27 per 100,000 inmates. Using the same formula, the rate in Georgia in 2019 was 44.