Consultant pleads guilty in Mississippi prison bribery case

(AP) — A business and government consultant has pleaded guilty to a federal bribery charge, admitting he paid thousands of dollars in kickbacks to the former head of Mississippi's prison system and a county supervisor on the Gulf Coast.

The Sun Herald reports (http://bit.ly/20HAFr2 ) the attorney for Robert Simmons says Simmons considered the payments "the cost of doing business in Mississippi."