The inmates of Arizona state prison who are selected by the st

The inmates of Arizona state prison who are selected by the state forest department to work as wilderness firefighters eat in the same cafeterias, sleep in the same campsites, and wear the same uniforms as their professional counterparts do, defying the rigid relationship barriers enforced inside prison walls.


A. defying the rigid relationship barriers enforced
--> The inmates did not intend to defy..., but the way they lived (an arrangement) did --> , V-ing is not appropriate.

B. defying the relationship barriers enforced rigidly
--> The inmates did not intend to defy..., but the way they lived (an arrangement) did --> , V-ing is not appropriate.

C. they defy the rigid relationship barriers enforced
--> run-on sentence.

D. an arrangement to defy the relationship barriers that are enforced rigidly
--> The inmates did not intend to defy, so the use to defy is inappropriate .

E. an arrangement that defies the rigid relationship barriers enforced
--> correct.

Look out for 'ing verb' modifiers that appear at the end of a sentence, after a comma. These are a bit of a special case. They don't modify the closest noun in the sentence; rather, they modify the main subject and verb of the sentence. In this case, the main subject and verb(s) are 'the inmates eat, sleep, and wear'. The problem is that it isn't the inmates who are defying barriers by eating, sleeping, and wearing. That would imply that the inmates somehow choose to defy barriers through their actions. (E) changes the meaning to a more logical one, by substituting the ing-verb modifier with an appositive modifier. An appositive modifier, which starts with a noun, makes it clear that the entire arrangement defies barriers, not the inmates themselves.