Controversial and somewhat weird. Authenticity also doesn't always win and looking at san andreas my favorite GTA which was probably the least authentic to reality with characters that were clearly defined by very few things (hippy pot head, chinese triad boss) and jet packs I'm not too sure what to make of it.
Also I don't want to judge the deal they struck. I mean since I don't really know what kind of people they've hired. People that got convicted for rape? Drug Possesion/dealing? Assault? Stealing? Also are these people 60-70 something year old people convicts coming out of jail? Or are they people they got through some form of rehabilitation program? No fucking idea.
In any case the moral and ethics to this like many things change depending on the situation and the judgement of each individual.
Now without knowing exactly the penalties are, I'd have to say I can't begrudge them giving someone that got 10-20 years because of drugs or something a second chance if the guy seemingly passes all the regret/rehab parameters the system has for letting them out. But that example is super specific and rather simplified. Point is I don't really like to join the pitch fork group on this without knowing anything.