TY  - JOUR
A1  - Radeloff, Daniel
A1  - Lempp, Thomas
A1  - Kettner, Mattias
A1  - Rauf, Amna
A1  - Bennefeld-Kersten, Katharina
A1  - Freitag, Christine M.
T1  - Male suicide rates in German prisons and the role of citizenship
T2  - PLoS one
N2  - Purpose: Prisoners are at a particularly high risk of suicide. In contrast to other psychosocial risk factors it remains unclear to what degree the risk of suicide differs between prisoners with local citizenship and foreigners. In order to provide more detailed information for suicide prevention in prisons, this study aims to compare suicide rates (SR) between these populations in German criminal custody.
Methods: Based on a German national database of completed suicide in custody, suicides by prisoners were analysed and compared with epidemiological data of the prison population and the general population, stratified for German and foreign citizenship. Data analysis was adjusted for differences in the age distribution of both populations by calculating standard mortality ratios (SMR) for suicide.
Results: SR were higher in prisoners with German citizenship than those with foreign citizenship (SR = 76.5 vs. SR = 42.8, P<0.01). This association was not specific to the prison population, as the higher SR in citizens compared to non-citizens (SR = 19.3 vs. SR = 9.0, P<0.01) were also found in the general population. The association between prison suicide and citizenship was comparable in juvenile and adult prisoners, indicating its relevance to both the juvenile and adult detention systems.
Conclusion: Imprisonment is associated with a substantially increased risk of suicide in both German and non-German citizens, a finding which needs to be taken into consideration by the justice system. The lower suicide risk in non-German citizens is independent of whether or not they are in custody.
Y1  - 2017
UR  - http://publikationen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/43997
UR  - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-439973
SN  - 1932-6203
N1  - Copyright: © 2017 Radeloff et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
VL  - 12
IS  - (6): e0178959
SP  - 1
EP  - 11
PB  - PLoS
CY  - Lawrence, Kan.
ER  -