Tracking Prison Censorship in the United States

Cynthia Bostic, Assistant Director
Support Services
4274 Mail Service Center
Raleigh, NC 27699-4274

30 July 2012

To Ms. Bostic,

We received a letter to publisher from Fay Lassiter notifying MIM Distributors that Under Lock & Key No. 21 has been disapproved for prisoners in North Carolina. The form indicates the reason as "H", but there is no reason for disapproval on the subsequent page where Reason .0109 H is listed. Last week I just responded to another letter where that was also the case, which makes it hard for us to address your concerns when we don't know what is objectionable nor why. Thankfully, Mr. XXXXXX notified us that the reason for the censorship was given to him as an article on U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan. As he stated in his appeal, the same content was available to him via numerous other news sources, so it seems to be discriminatory that MIM Distributors is being censored for covering this story.

In light of these facts, I would like to request that an independent review of Under Lock & Key No. 21 be done, and that the results be sent to me at the address below. I am also requesting that future notices of disapproval include a justification for the disapproval so that we can both try to address the problem in the future as well as ensure that this censorship is not occurring arbitrarily or discriminatorily, as it might appear.


Sincerely,

I write in solidarity with those involved with the censor campaign. Power to those who down to struggle, and up to win. Today while on the kennel cage rec yard I was approached by a California State Prison Corcoran (CSPC) employee representing a flawed mail room, carrying an envelope addressed to the young cadre sent from MIM Distributors containing MIM Theory 7 in one hand and a CDCR 602 appeal in the other.

After months of going back and forth between the Appeal Coordinator and the mail room, utilizing a combination of the institutional informal correspondence system and the appeals procedures, CSPC finally figured out that I was building a paper trail capable of exposing their mail censorship practices against those they deem paper-terrorists.

The staff gave me the MT 7 journal, after previously saying that the journal was a violation against California Correctional Regulations for supposedly inciting riots and so on. They instructed me to either withdraw the complaint or settle it if I wanted the MT 7. Of course I settles it to preserve the right of the appeal for the breach of settlement agreement. Because of their COINTEL B.$. they've delayed my study group participation, and I've got a lot to do to catch up. But with hard work comes hard results.

Comrades should note that this incident of CSPC issuing me MIM Theory 7: Revolutionary Nationalism is proof that not only are they profiling MIM Distributors with bogus censorships claiming safety and security, but also their claims hold no weight in the people's court.