"There is no statistical evidence that RID is successful. We are looking at return on our investment. We want to set a date to phase it out."
— State Rep. Toby Barker, R-Hattiesburg, on a boot-camp-style program of the Mississippi Department of Corrections that he proposes eliminating.
Why It Stinks: State Rep. Adrienne Wooten, D-Jackson, a criminal defense attorney, informed Barker, an advertising executive, during debate that she rarely encounters repeat offenders from the Regimented Inmate Discipline program. Wooten even pressed Barker to provide data that RID program participants had high recidivism rates, which Barker admitted he could not furnish. As Mississippi's prison system, which has been plagued by scandal, remains under a microscope for the alleged misdeeds of its former commissioner, it would be nice if the agency could at least keep all the tools at its disposal to close the revolving door at prisons. But maybe that's too much to ask.
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