[Stardust]

COVINGTON – If you commit the crime, you’ll do the time – in hot pink.

http://nky.cincinnati.com/article/AB/200.../302270040

That’s the new look at the Kenton County jail, where traditional orange prison jump suits were replaced Friday with hot pink ones.

The switch was prompted one Sunday afternoon last fall when Col. Scott Colvin, chief deputy jailer, was looking from his office window toward Paul Brown Stadium and noticed all the Cincinnati Bengals fans decked out in orange.

“I thought ‘Man, if someone got away from here, they’d score a hot dog AND get away,’” Colvin said.

He talked about it with Jailer Terry Carl, who approved the switch.

The jail purchases new garb each year to serve up to 500 inmates. The cost is the same, no matter the color.

Other jails around the country have also gone with the pink look.

Joe Arpaio, sheriff in Maricopa County, Ariz., probably best known for creating tent jails in the desert, marched inmates from one jail to another in 2005, allowing them to wear nothing but pink underwear and pink flip-flops.

Jim Roberson, sheriff in Lonoke County, Ark., purchased pink jump suits last summer, the same type Kenton County bought.

“We wanted to be able to pick them out quickly when they’re in court or on the side of the road in our work-release program,” Roberson said. “It works.”

He said the male inmates don’t seem to mind. Interestingly enough, the female prisoners usually don’t like them.

“I have no idea why,” Roberson said. “But they get really mad about them.”

Roberson said he’s had a couple of prisoners in the last year tell him, upon their release, that they’re not coming back because they don’t like wearing pink.

Colvin said it may be ambitious to think the uniform color will deter crime in Kenton County, but…

“Maybe it is viable,” Colvin said. “I don’t know yet.”

Kenton County Commonwealth’s Attorney Rob Sanders said no prisoner should be more comfortable in prison than at home, whether it be the bed he sleeps in, food he eats or clothing he wears.

“And if there’s anything a jailer can do to deter one person from coming back, such as making them wear pink clothes, then I’m all for it,” Sanders said.

And what if an inmate refuses to wear it?

“Then they’ll end up walking around in their underwear,” Colvin said, “because Kenton County is wearing hot pink.”