Overview

• As of December 2024, Mexico’s 325 prison facilities held 236,773 inmates at 102.9% of their combined capacity.
• Unsentenced detainees accounted for 36.3% of the prison population, reflecting a modest decline from 37.2% in 2023.
• Women faced disproportionate pretrial detention, with 46.3% still awaiting sentencing compared to 35.7% of men.
• Federal prisons recorded narcotics cases as the top entry offense for women (34.4%) and arms and explosives charges for men (33.7%), whereas robbery led admissions in state facilities at 25.6% for women and 27.2% for men.
• Combined federal and state prison budgets rose to 43.87 billion pesos in 2024, marking a 54.6% increase in real terms since 2017.