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The U.S. Department of Justice says one out of every 31 Americans is either in jail, prison or on probation or parole. The current economy could make that worse.
In Utah, the percentage of people in the justice system is slightly lower than the national numbers, according to Utah Department of Corrections spokeswoman Angie Welling.
Welling says the numbers going to prison have actually flattened out, at least for the moment. "The conventional wisdom is that as the economy sees a downturn, we see a slight uptick in crime," she said.
But Welling says Utah hasn't seen that uptick yet. She says they usually plan on adding 228 inmates to the prison each year.
E-mail: rjeppesen@ksl.com
