My uncle is a senior co in mississippi, and the stories he's told me (from his perspective) blew me away about prison.
10 times out of 10 I bet the guys getting treated like shit are inmates and not convicts. That's the first thing he mentioned to me. Inmates are not long timers like convicts, so they are more unruly and less likely to follow the prison system rules..etc.
You can't have that because there will be followers, pack mentality snowballs, now your unit is out of control and unruly.....so THAT inmate 10/10 will get destroyed later on and reality is brought upon him really fast.
My uncle is an extremely nice person.