Tracking Prison Censorship in the United States

Publications Review Committee
Virginia Department of Corrections
PO Box 26963
Richmond, VA 23261

November 27, 2014

RE: Censorship of Under Lock & Key #39 and draft issue #40 to XXX

Dear Publications Review Committee,

Recently MIM Distributors was informed by Mr. XX that Under Lock & Key #39 (July/August 2014) and Draft ULK #40 were disapproved by the Publication Review Committee. We did not receive any notification of this censorship. You are required, by Virginia Inmate Mail policy, to notify us of these rejections: "If opened, the unauthorized correspondence will be returned directly to the sender if known, with a written explanation for disapproval." (see https://vadoc.virginia.gov/offenders/prison-life/mail.shtm)

Further, court cases have upheld this requirement. In particular Montcalm Publishing Co. v. Beck, 80 F.3d105 (4th Cir. 1996) includs the following ruling regarding Virginia Department of Corrections Operating Procedure: "We hold that publishers are entitled to notice and an opportunity to be heard when their publications are disapproved for receipt by inmate subscribers."

We were never notified of this mail rejection, a clear violation of policy. Furtther, on August 26 we received a letter from Louis B Cei, Chair of this committee assuring us that we would receive notification of future mail denials. We appreciate Mr. Cei's assurance but we need to see the follow through and actually receive these denial notifications or you will continue to be out of compliance with your own policies.

We request the following actions:
- A copy of the official inmate mail policy for the VA DOC
- Notification of all MIM Distributors rejected mail directly from the prison upon rejection
- Appeal the censorship of the two publications listed above

I appreciate your consideration, and anticipate your response.

Sincerely,

MIM Distributors

CC: Affected parties
Benjamin Wright, Warden
River North Correctional Center
329 Dell Brook Lane
Independence, VA 24348

Deputy Director
Division of Operations
Virginia Department of Corrections
PO Box 26963
Richmond, VA 23261

March 18, 2015

RE: Censorship of Under Lock & Key #39 to Mr. XXX

Dear Deputy Director,

We recently received a copy of the notification to publisher of publication disapproval for Under Lock & Key #39, which was mailed to Mr. XXX. Please note that we did not receive this letter on the date it was generated (November 11, 2014) but only were sent a copy after we appealed the lack of notification of censorship to the Publication Review committee. As a result, it was impossible for us to appeal the decision within 15 calendar days.

This letter is to request a review of the denial. The reason cited is Criteria D which reads: "Material, documents or photographs that emphasize depictions or promotions of violence, disorder, insurrection, terrorist, or criminal activity in violation of state or federal laws or the violation of the Offender Disciplinary Procedure."

In the rejection notice it states "The numbers for those pages that were reviewed on which violations were found are listed above with the issue containing them." But there are no pages listed.

With this letter we request a list of specific pages in Under Lock & Key #39 that meet Criteria D, and an explanation of the content on those pages that is promoting the acts in question. We are confident that there is no such content in our publication.

I look forward to your response.

Sincerely,

Christine Eacho, Chair
Publications Review Committee
Virginia Department of Corrections
PO Box 26963
Richmond, VA 23261

March 18, 2015

RE: Censorship of Under Lock & Key #39 to Mr. XXX and Disapproved Publications List

Dear Publications Review Committee,

Thank you for your December 22, 2014 response to our letter protesting the denial of mail to Mr. XXX. In your letter you explain that we can not expect notification until the PRC has reviewed mail, potentially 30-60 days after it has been confiscated. We look forward to consistent notification from your committee any time mail is denied in the future. We did not ever receive a copy of the November 11 denial you mention and so we appreciate the copy you sent to us. Please note that there appears to be some problem with the PRC process for mailing out these notifications which we hope you will investigate so that we receive such mail in the future without needing to protest the lack of notification first. We also have not received any follow up on draft issue 40. Given that it has been more than 60 days we wonder if the notification was also lost for that disapproval.

You also say "PRC will not generate a list of disapproved rejected publications at this time, as this was generated to you previously." I am confused by this statement. First, even if we had received such a list in the past, clearly the list is changing all the time with review of new publications and potential reversals of previous rejections. This is not a valid reason to refuse to send us the requested information. In reality, just like the letters notifying us of mail denials, the disapproved publication list never reached our mailbox. There may be a problem with your records regarding mail you believe was sent to us, since none of it is actually getting here. Further, you do not mention our September 10 letter to the PRC in which we noted that:

"You mention that several of our publications are on the Master Disapproved list for reasons that do not match with the list we received from Mr. XXXXXX. Mr. XXXXXX received his list from the prison so there is apparently some incorrect information circulating and being misapplied by staff. We hope you will be able to clear up this confusion and ensure VA policies regarding mail will be applied appropriately.

"Please forward us a copy of this master disapproved list so that we can have a complete list of our publications that have been censored and the reasons for this. Mr. XXXXXX is being denied our literature for reasons of sex acts or Spanish content, which your letter confirms is incorrect. We will be able to use your Master List to appropriately appeal the denials. Similarly, we would like to know which MIM Theory journals are approved for offenders to purchase as you indicated that 5 of them are on the list as approved."

As you can clearly see, there are discrepancies on the list, and reasons given for disapproval that make absolutely no sense and do not match the content of the publications. Again we reiterate our request that you send us a copy of the most recent disapproved publications. There is no reasonable justification for refusing this request.

I look forward to your response.

Sincerely,

Publications Review Committee
Virginia Department of Corrections
PO Box 26963
Richmond, VA 23261

June 20, 2015

RE: Disapproved Publications List

Dear Mr. Moody,

Thank you for your April 14, 2015 response to our March letter requesting a copy of all disapproved publications from our company. The list that you sent is very helpful. In summary, it appears that the following publications are disapproved:

Under Lock & Key 15, 20, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 33, 36, 37, and 39

For some of these publications page numbers are listed which we assume are the cause of the denials. And for all there is a letter code listed which is either “D”, “F” or both “D,F”. From the 803-2 Incoming Publications rules (https://vadoc.virginia.gov/about/procedures/documents/800/803-2.pdf) I assume these refer to the reasons:

D. Material, documents, or photographs that emphasize depictions or promotions of violence, disorder, insurrection, terrorist, or criminal activity in violation of state or federal laws or the violation of the Offender Disciplinary Procedure
Note: This criterion shall not be used to exclude publications that describe such acts in the context of a story or moral teaching unless the description of such acts is the primary purpose of the publication. No publication generally recognized as having artistic or literary value should be excluded under this criterion.

F. Material that depicts, describes, or promotes gang bylaws, initiations, organizational structure, codes, or other gang-related activity or association

Fortunately for all concerned, none of the publications on this list violate either of these criteria. We would remind you that the rule D actually includes the very important caveat: “This criterion shall not be used to exclude publications that describe such acts in the context of a story or moral teaching unless the description of such acts is the primary purpose of the publication.” We encourage you to initiate a review of all rejections to forestall future legal action.

We also want to address the publications NOT on this list. The following publications have been rejected by Virginia prisons, apparently in contradiction with the determination by your Publication Review Committee:

Under Lock & Key 32
MIM Theory 10
MIM Theory 9

Now that we have clearly established which publications are denied, we ask that the above publications, which are approved for receipt by VA prisoners, be delivered to Mr. XXX.

Lastly, you did not address our request from April:

Similarly, we would like to know which MIM Theory journals are approved for offenders to purchase as you indicated that 5 of them are on the list as approved.

We anxiously anticipate your response with a list of APPROVED MIM Theory journals.

I look forward to your response.

Sincerely,