Prison Rape Elimination Act Resources

Topic

Date of Publication
January, 2015

The Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) was signed into law in 2003 and in 2012, the Department of Justice standards that govern its implementation in most types of detention facilities were finalized.

The purpose of these standards is to tell facilities that are covered under PREA, what they need to do in order to be compliant. A number of these standards relate to a facility's responsibility to provide incarcerated survivors with access to sexual assault advocacy services. It was the responsibility of the Department of Homeland Security to create and enforce rules that tell Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facilities how to implement the law.1 These rules were finalized in 2014.

All facilities are required by the PREA standards to provide incarcerated and detained survivors with access to victim advocacy services. These services are intended to be confidential and provided by a trained advocate from a community program. Facilities should be working with local sexual assault advocacy programs to coordinate advocacy services for these survivors, and it's helpful for advocacy programs to know what PREA requires about access to their services.

Notes and References

  1. Unaccompanied immigrant and refugee minors are in the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) Division of Unaccompanied Children’s Services, and not Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The ORR has not finalized its rules for how PREA should be implemented in its facilities, however, ORR facilities are required to comply with the Interim Final Rule.

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