Tracking Prison Censorship in the United States

DAI Deputy Director
Department of Corrections
2729 Plaza Drive
Jefferson City, MO 65109

3 June 2013

RE: Censorship of Under Lock & Key Issue 31

Dear Mr. Dormire,

We have received many notices, from multiple institutions in the Missouri DOC that state that Under Lock & Key, March/April, Issue #31 has been censored by the department. This letter is to request an independent review of this decision.

Since various reasons have been given by different wardens I have included the documents stating their reasons. Below I will attempt to briefly address them as I understand them.

Staff at Jefferson City Correctional Center cite "IS13-1.2 Censorship Procedure III C-2 a.," which refers to "promotes, incites or advocates violence, disorder or the violation of state or federal law, or advocates, facilitates or otherwise presents a risk of lawlessness?" and they refer to page 15. This was the same rule cited to censor issue #30, which you agreed was in error back in April. However, this time I'm not even sure what this rule is in reference to as the contents of page 15 of Under Lock & Key #31 is merely an article on education, a description of the organization that publishes the newsletter and a reader survey.

The explanations from Western Missouri Correctional Center and Southeast Correctional Center both make reference to the newsletter explaining how to organize a group. Omer Clark cites page 2 of the newsletter, which is merely a description of the organizations that write and produce the newsletter. That page also discourages the use of violence against staff and other prisoners. It seems that to censor literature for containing such descriptions would lead to an across the board ban on any literature that is published by "an organization."

I hope that you can clarify these matters for us as well as those attempting to censor our mail. Thank you for taking the time to review this matter.

Sincerely,

The policy on bartering and trading applies only on an inmate-to-inmate basis and makes no mention about transactions with outside organizations. In addition, just because the organization offered the option of trading work for study, does not mean that the inmate will exercise that option, much less choose to participate in the course offered.

Thornburgh v. Abbot, 490 U.S. 401: "Wardens may not reject a publication ' solely because its content is religious, philosophical, political, social, sexual or... unpopular or repugnant.'"