Through effective suicide risk assessment and prevention policies and procedures, GEO’s Behavioral Health care experts, working closely with Secure Services staff, are dedicated and committed to eliminating and reducing the risk of self-destructive individual behaviors of all those entrusted to our care.
The responsibility for preventing self-harm incidents involves every staff member who has any interaction with the population. It does not solely involve the care provided by medical or behavioral health staff, but a commitment by all staff to observe for warning signs indicating that an individual may be at risk.
Training, observation, identification, and communication are essential in assessing and treating at-risk individuals. Training in suicide prevention begins at the time of initial staff orientation and then annually thereafter. Staff are trained in identifying potential risk factors which may indicate that an individual may be considering suicide or self-harm.
The inmate or detainee will be provided appropriate follow-up care by behavioral health staff after discontinuing suicide watch to reassess risk and for diagnosis and treatment planning. In summary, successful suicide prevention involves a commitment by all staff to observe and identify inmate or detainee behavior which may indicate increased risk.
In addition to an emphasis on the importance of training, communication between security and both
nursing and behavioral health staff is stressed along with the importance of providing quality behavioral health care for those who present with symptoms of a mental illness.
Lastly, there is an emphasis on guarding against complacency or going through the motions since at any given time, there may be an inmate or detainee who is at risk for suicide, and staff are aware of this in every interaction with the goal of proper identification and referral for behavioral health care.
In 2021, the Bureau of Justice Statistics calculated the rate of suicide in jails and prisons in the United States. An analysis of GEO’s suicide rates using the same methodology demonstrates that rates of suicide are lower in GEO-operated facilities than those in Federal Prisons, approximately twice as low as those in State Prisons, and significantly lower than those in County Jails.
Suicide Rates for GEO vs. Federal & State Prisons and Jails*
*The most recent year that the Bureau of Justice has statistics on prison suicide rates in the United States is
2021. For comparability purposes, GEO’s suicide rate is based on data from 2021. For 2023, GEO’s suicide rate was 12 per 100,000.
