Rather than allow inmates to receive personal letters,
drawings from their children, photographs, birthday cards, and other kinds of
mail directly, the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections will use a new
service that will cost taxpayers at least $376,000 a month, or well over $4
million a year, reported Reason Magazine.
As explained on its
website, the department implemented the new policy after staff members were
reportedly sickened by an unknown substance, which prompted the announcement of
a statewide lockdown in August. Mail will first go through a Florida-based
service called Smart Communications. The company will scan the mail and then
send black and white digital copies to inmates. The original mail, including
photographs, will then be held for 45 days and subsequently destroyed. The
electronic mail will only be saved for seven years. Mail related to legal
matters and other official documents will be forwarded to the institutions,
opened in front of the inmate, copied, and the originals will be destroyed
after a 15-day retention period. Inmates will not be able to keep the
originals.
The department maintains that the process will help cut down
on a the amount of drugs smuggled into state prisons, even documenting
drug finds on various inmates. It's also a good business opportunity
for private companies seeking to contract with prisons. Smart Communications
already provides limited email technology and a teleconferencing system to
prisons, and now touts its mail system as completely eliminating postal
mail. Bloomberg quotes Corrections
Accountability Project Director Bianca Tylek, who believes digitized mail
services could earn private contractors "more than $180 million
annually."
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