Tracking Prison Censorship in the United States

Department of Corrections
ATTN: Library Service Administrator
501 S Calhoun St
Tallahassee, FL 32399-2500

January 22, 2015

RE: Failure to notify publisher of censorship of Under Lock & Key

Dear Sir/Madam,

This letter is to document that once again MIM Distributors was not notified by the Florida Department of Corrections (FDOC) when its publications were impounded or rejected. I am requesting that the FDOC follow its own policies and respect the publisher's rights to Due Process under the Fourteenth Amendment (see Montcalm Publ'g Corp. v. Beck, 80 F.3d 105, 106 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, 519 U.S. 928 (1996)).

In September 2013, my colleague XX wrote to you regarding this same matter and Susan Hughes responded explaining that only one facility will notify the publisher of censorship. However, once again, no FDOC staff has notified MIM Distributors of the censorship of multiple issues of Under Lock & Key including:

Two items sent to YYY at Dade Correctional Institution
Under Lock & Key 40 mailed 9/26/2014
Under Lock & Key 41 mailed 12/10/2014

Two items sent to ZZZ at Suwanee Correctional Institution
Under Lock & Key 40 mailed 9/26/2014
Under Lock & Key 39 mailed 8/1/2014

I hope that you will honor my request for an appeal of this decision to censor, since the FDOC failed to notify MIM Distributors of the censorship and therefore the 15 days within receiving notice has not yet been passed.


Sincerely,



MIM Distributors
PO Box 40799
San Francisco, CA 94140

CC: Affected parties

Department of Corrections
ATTN: Library Service Administrator
501 S Calhoun St
Tallahassee, FL 32399-2500

January 12, 2015

RE: Impounding of Under Lock & Key No. 41 at FSP

Dear Ms. Morrison,

This letter is in response to a notification received by Mr. XXX at Florida State Prison of the impounding of Under Lock & Key No. 41. The purpose of this letter is to appeal this decisions and have the newsletter delivered to Mr. XXX.

The Supreme Court decision governing the First Amendment in prisons in the United States (Thornburgh, 490 U.S. at 416 n.14) is clear that regulations barring writings that "express 'inflammatory political, racial, religious or other views'" were not sufficiently "neutral" or "unrelated to the suppression of expression" to be legally allowable.

The Florida State Prison notice cites multiple articles on several pages as justifying the denial because "It otherwise presents a threat to the security, good order, or discipline of the correctional system or the safety of any person." All of the articles listed discuss the history of prison control units and gang validation. There is nothing in these articles that present a threat to security or safety. It may be the case that those reviewing this publication disagreed with the perspective presented in these articles, but the rejection of publications that one finds disagreeable is a violation of the Constitution of the United State, which your department is bound to uphold. Certainly no ones safety is being threatened in any of these articles reporting on conditions in prisons and gang validation policies. Stating these articles are ?inflammatory? does not pass the standard set by Thornburgh for censoring mail to prisoners.

I am requesting that you allow Mr. XXX to receive Issue 41 of Under Lock & Key.


Sincerely,

Kathryn Graves, Legal Assistant
MIM Distributors
PO Box 40799
San Francisco, CA 94140

CC: Affected parties

The Literature Review Committee met on January 14, 2015. Based on the material supplied to us by Florida State Prison, the Committee voted to reject issue 41 of Under Lock & Key.

In response to your appeal, I will put this issue on the agenda for the next scheduled meeting of the Literature Review Committee. We will discuss your comments and look at the copies we have once again. I will advise you of the Committee's action after the January 28 meeting.

Sincerely,
Martha Morrison