John Pfaff‘s research was cited in a Republican-American article about a myth surrounding the U.S. prison population.
Undeniably, state prisons house the vast majority of offenders, and their population grew from 294,000 in 1980 to 1.36 million in 2009, a stunning 363 percent increase. It has been on a downward trajectory since the latter date, however. But only 21 percent of that growth resulted from the imprisonment of drug offenders, most of which occurred between 1980 and 1989, according to a review of government data reported by Fordham University law professor John Pfaff in the Harvard Journal of Legislation. More than half of the overall increase was because of punishment of violent offenses, not drugs, Pfaff reports.
Reviewing data admittedly drawn mostly from northern “blue” states, Pfaff determined “the median stay in prison for a drug offender is generally about a year,” and “relatively few people appear to be in prison on marijuana charges” — fewer still for simple possession.