International Law

Prisoners to get email access

By John Hirst

The Director General of Prisons and Probation, Phil Wheatley, is investigating the possibility of allowing prisoners access to email facilities. He is interested in the model currently used in some US prisons. Obviously, there will be security issues. Nevertheless, I believe these are outweighed by the positive aspects.

Some might well say that Conrad Black is not a role model prisoner, but he "has virtually unlimited access to newspapers and email.

As a result, the restrictions of jail have not prevented Conrad from sharing with a wider public his views on, among other matters, the U.S. Presidential election campaign and the state of the world's economy.

Through a clever bit of email chicanery, he still manages to pen a fairly regular column for the Saturday edition of the National Post, forwarded to the newspaper, according to comment editor Jonathan Kay, by 'a friend, business contact or relative' of Black's who has the prison's pre-approval for email correspondence".

Not all prisoners are as inventive as Conrad Black, most will simply use email to keep in closer contact with their families.

UPDATE: Following "an ACLU lawsuit in California, a federal judge affirmed the right of inmates to receive e-mail correspondence".

UPDATED UPDATE: Found this interesting snippet Prisoners to get email access.

And Prisoners may get email access

Full post as published by prisonlawinsideout on August 22, 2008 (boomark / email).