Director's Message

Salisbury Bio Pic
Wayne T. Salisbury, Jr., Acting Director

On behalf of the 1,400 men and women employed at the Rhode Island Department of Corrections (RIDOC), I am pleased to welcome you to our Department's website. I invite you to familiarize yourself with our agency via this brief introduction and the more detailed pages which follow.

The RIDOC is a "full service" correctional agency. Every adult under correctional supervision (pretrial detention, sentence to incarceration, sentence to probation, sentence to home confinement or release on parole supervision) in this state falls within our jurisdiction. The RIDOC's facilities are known collectively as the Adult Correctional Institutions (ACI).

Consistent with our Mission Statement, staff work very hard to supervise offenders in a manner consistent with public protection and to provide them with programming opportunities designed to help them become productive and law-abiding members of the community.

Significant issues, which make our Mission both challenging and rewarding, include:

  • Maintaining safe and secure facilities amidst a surge in gang-related activity;

  • Dealing with continued growth in the offender population - both in our facilities and under community supervision;

  • Implementing a comprehensive program of drug interdiction, testing, graduated sanctions, and treatment for offenders - institutionalized, on probation and parole, and home confinement;

  • Enhancing staff in-service training programs to ensure they remain current with changes in policy and practice and are fulfilling for staff participants;

  • Retooling our overloaded probation system to enhance supervision of offenders in the community;

  • Promoting greater diversity in our workforce in response to the increasing diversity of the offender population;

  • Increasing the Department's sensitivity to victims of crime;

  • Strengthening the process of transition for offenders leaving the institutional setting and moving into the community;

  • Forging stronger links to community-based services in such areas as mental health and job development;

  • Developing a strategy to renovate or replace our aged Maximum Security facility.