jail-photo-stock-apImagine if you still had 15 years left on that loan from your bank, but one day when you went to pay, the system says that you don’t owe the bank any money. Sounds too good to be true, right? That’s pretty much what happened with thousands of prisoners in Washington state where they were granted early releases.

However like we said, it was too good to be true because according to reports, it turns out that it was a software glitch that saw about 3,200 prisoners get early releases. So much so that Washington Governor Jay Inslee had to order corrections officials to halt some prison releases due to the error in the software.

So what happened? Turns out that this problem has been dating back to 2002. This is apparently due to “good time” credit where duration in prison is reduced in exchange for participating in rehab programs, for example. However the system had been over-crediting inmates over the past few years, thus resulting in prisoners being released earlier than they should.

The problem was discovered in 2012 and a fix was supposed to made but was delayed on numerous occasions. According to a statement issued by Inslee, “That this problem was allowed to continue for 13 years is deeply disappointing to me, totally unacceptable and, frankly, maddening.”

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