How we got here and why we still have work to do

Mississippi’s prison population has grown 396% between 1980 and 2022. It currently has the highest imprisonment rate in the world. Despite recent reforms, the Mississippi prison population continues to increase because those reforms were not fully implemented and were too limited for Mississippi to see the same sustained decline in the state’s prison population that other states have experienced. Mississippi’s growing prison population imposes high costs on the state’s economy, communities and families without improving public safety. State lawmakers must continue to make critically needed and evidence-based criminal justice reforms a priority every legislative session and work with criminal justice practitioners to ensure past reforms are fully implemented.