Project for Opportunity and Safety

Mississippi’s ‘Laboratory of Democracy’ Deserves Notice

Murders, sexual batteries, burglaries, drug transfers — I prosecuted them all.

From 2003 to 2011, first as a Youth Court prosecutor and then as an assistant district attorney for seven years, I interacted with families, victims, court personnel and jurors affiliated with violent and non-violent crimes.

Tough on crime? You bet. That has always been and continues to be my modus operandi.

Mississippi’s second-degree murder statute? I drafted and championed it.

The Lonnie Smith Act strengthening Mississippi’s child abuse statute? I drafted the Senate bill and championed it.

GPS monitoring for sex offenders in Mississippi? I co-sponsored it.

Additional prosecutors throughout Mississippi? I secured them via my position on Senate Appropriations.

Those eight years in the prosecutor’s offices, though, could best be described as witnessing a “revolving door”: Addicts, families and criminals were all continually revolving through the door with no solution in sight. There had to be a better way.

Between 1983 and 2013, in response to the crack epidemic and a rise in violent crimes, “tough on crime” legislation became popular.

The prison population in Mississippi rose 300 percent to 22,400 inmates, second in the nation only to Louisiana. Of these 22,400 inmates, 75 to 80 percent of them were on probation or parole and 15 to 20 percent were incarcerated.

By 2013, 85 percent of the Mississippi Department of Corrections’ state budget dollars were funding the 15 percent in prison. Additionally, under the radar, in response to bloating MDOC budgets, the Mississippi Legislature passed laws reducing sentences and increasing good behavior time, effectively ceding power to a corrupt MDOC agency, resulting in distrust in the system and violent offenders on the streets, including in Jackson County, my home county.

These facts are best described with two words: Broken and inefficient. This inefficiency of the state government led to a coalition of policymakers throughout the nation, including former Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia and President Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform, coming together through the Texas Public Policy Institute and Right on Crime, to draft comprehensive reform legislation that would push Mississippi’s criminal justice system into the 21st century.

The result? Along with Texas, Mississippi has become a leader in criminal justice reform.

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