The city's prison population is on the rise again.
The Pew Chartiable Trusts Philadelphia Research Initiative reported Thursday that 8,732 people were behind bars in June, an 8.5 percent increase from the same point last year.
Pew said the population numbers have been higher every month this year than they were in 2011.
The jump comes after two years of decreases to the prison population.
City officials said the increase is somewhat attributed to two factors: Mayor Nutter's plea from earlier this year for the courts to implement higher bail figures for suspects who are charged with illegal gun possession, and automatic contempt charges, plus higher bail, for suspects who have failed to appear in court.
