Prisoner Rights

PHOENIX, Az. - Death row inmates and other state prisoners banned from cyberspace are now back in - probably permanently.

A federal judge Monday temporarily stopped prison officials from enforcing a law that forbids prisoners from sending information, pictures and stories about their cases or themselves to Web sites that publish them.

District Judge Earl Carroll issued the temporary injunction on the Arizona law, enacted in 2000 to protect families of murder victims, saying the law violates freedom of speech.

David Fahti, staff counsel with the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Prison Project and co-counsel on the legal challenge, said the "battle is over" and doubts whether Arizona will push to have the statute upheld and enforced.

‘Chilled’ Advocacy Groups

"The judge’s opinion makes very clear he thinks this statute is unconstitutional," Fahti said. "I doubt there is anything the state can do to change his mind...At some point, the preliminary injunction will turn into a permanent injunction with either the state’s agreement. As of today, the state cannot enforce the statute."

A spokeswoman for the Arizona Attorney General's office did not immediately return a telephone call for comment Tuesday morning.

The Arizona law banned prisoners from posting information about their cases on the Web or corresponding using a remote computer service or communication service provider. Various anti-death penalty groups and other prisoner rights sites frequently provide inmates with Web space to tell about their cases, post pictures and solicit pen-pals.

Under the law, prisoners who kept information on the Web were subject to disciplinary measures and criminal prosecution. Fahti said that although no prisoner was criminally charged, some did loose prison privileges for having information posted about themselves on Web sites.

Prisoners Disciplined

The ACLU argued that the law had a chilling effect on advocacy groups who give prisoners Internet space and also sought to punish prisoners who spoke out. The ACLU had challenged the law on behalf of anti-death penalty and other advocacy groups.

The groups involved include the Canadian Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty and the Florida- based Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, both of which maintain prisoner pages.

"Arizona's attempt to censor Internet content was a frightening step toward government repression of free speech," said Eleanor Eisenberg, the executive director of the ACLU of Arizona, in a prepared statement. "Today's court order puts a timely and immediate stop to this ill-conceived law."

"Prisoners should not be punished for making public their claims of innocence," said Abe Bonowitz, director of Citizens United for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. "Today's decision is a tremendous victory for civil liberties and freedom of speech. And it's not just about prisoners. This benefits everyone."

Killer’s Picture On Net Sparked Push For Law

Attempting to restrict prisoner speech is not a new battleground and prison systems across the Untied States have been given wide leeway in the courts, under the guise of security, to prohibit certain activities by inmates.

In September, a U.S. district court judge in California ruled that prisoners have a First Amendment right to receive mail that contains material printed from the Internet

Gary Phelps, the chief of staff for the Arizona Department of Corrections, said in a interview with The Death House.com last July that the cyberspace ban was put in place to prevent victims from coming across the pictures and reading letters from the men and women who committed crimes against them.

Phelps said the law was proposed after relatives of a Tucson man who was murdered came across a Web site portraying the man convicted of the killing as a caring person and included a photo of him holding a cat.

He said the law was enacted by legislature, and not proposed by the Arizona Department of Corrections.

Stardust Johnson, the widow of the man killed, testified on behalf of the bill, saying that prisoners are sometimes manipulators, sociopaths and pscyhopaths who want to prey on people - and the Internet is a good way for them to do it.

"I think its a shame that this judge has determined that prisoners can have access," said State. Rep. Linday Gray, a Republican lawmaker from Phoenix who co-sponsored the legislation that led to the ban. "Because of their offenses against society, they should lose the priviledges that the rest of free American enjoys."

But, apparently not to say what they want on Web sites.

Feisty Anti-Death Penalty Site

Fahti said the genesis of the law proves that it was to "surpress unpopular speech" and not enacted for any legitimate security concern.

Prisoners, especially death row inmates who are held in isolation most of the day, frequently write to the sites requesting pen-pals, soliciting donations for defense funds or proclaiming their innocence. Some letters even tell of the inner workings of prison systems and alleged abuses. Many of the inmates also have their pictures posted on the sites.

On the forefront of the battle was the Canadian Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty, a feisty group that refers to Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating as "Killer Keating" and rips President George Bush, who the coalition accuses of "homicide," for okaying executions while governor of Texas.

After the Arizona law was enacted, the CCADP stated that an "Iron Curtain (was) emerging around America’s death camps."

In response to the ban, the CCADP announced that it had put the all Arizona death row prisoners online "to ensure they were not effectively silenced by the law."