Friends and family can no longer order reading material for inmates at Missouri prisons.
The Missouri Department of Corrections announced the policy change Aug. 25 in its Family and Friends Newsletter. The new policy requires offenders to purchase books, magazines, newspapers and other publications and subscriptions from only prison-approved vendors.
The policy change has drawn the attention of advocacy groups, who describe it as inconsistent and “a de facto book ban for all residents.”
“People are really upset by it,” Lori Curry, executive director of Missouri Prison Reform, told the News Tribune. The advocacy nonprofit partnered with Liberation Lit, the Missouri Justice Coalition and the MacArthur Justice Center to put out a statement denouncing the policy.
In its newsletter, the Missouri Department of Corrections states the new policy will help the department “limit the avenues used for introduction of drugs and contraband into facilities.” All reading materials must meet censorship guidelines and cannot cost more than $100, exceed property limits or threaten the safety or security of the prison.
The department also provides reading materials in the library and chapel at each prison, according to the newsletter.
Limiting drugs and contraband was the reasoning behind the department’s previous policy that required publications to come directly from vendors, according to the advocacy groups.
“We have only been allowed to send books in through approved vendors all along,” Curry said. “So if I wanted to send a book to my loved one, I had to order it from Amazon and ship it directly to him — I never touched the book so there wasn’t really opportunity for us to put drugs in books.”
“It sounds like they’re accusing Amazon and other vendors of putting drugs in books for us,” she continued. “It sounds kind of silly.”
Offenders often use books for education and entertainment, Curry said, adding they’re one of the few items someone could send as a gift for birthdays or holidays. Now, she said she would have to send her incarcerated loved one money to order a book, which comes with additional fees collected by Securus Technologies.
“Now they’ve taken that away, and it feels like a step closer to losing in-person visits, which is a huge concern for incarcerated people and their loved ones,” Curry said.
The department cited drugs and contraband when it limited physical mail to prisons in July 2022. The number of prison overdoses didn’t decrease in the months that followed and those within the facilities blamed staff for smuggling, according to previous News Tribune reporting.
The department stopped tracking overdoses shortly after, according to a response to a records request that Missouri Prison Reform submitted in December 2022. At least 85 people in Missouri prisons have died of varying causes so far this year, according to the department.
“Incarceration is supposed to be about rehabilitation and returning prison residents back to society better people,” Michelle Smith, founder of the Missouri Justice Coalition and co-director of Missourians to Abolish the Death Penalty, said in a statement. “Cutting off the last remaining avenue loved ones had to support their incarcerated family and friends by providing educational, legal and inspiring reading materials plainly shows that the MoDOC does not have rehabilitation in mind for residents of Missouri prison facilities.”
The advocacy groups called on the department to bolster methods for locating drugs, tracking its presence in facilities and “stem the actual source of drugs.”
“Further punishing and violating the rights of prison residents and families is not justifiable or acceptable,” the statement read.
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