Prison volunteers, inmates gain right to correspond Settlement reverses previous policy

ROCKLAND – The state Department of Corrections wrapped up a court settlement Monday just in time for Christmas that allows prison volunteers to correspond with inmates and to write personal messages in greeting cards.

The settlement, filed in Knox County Superior Court, reversed a previous policy that prohibited correspondence between inmates and volunteers.

“I think it’s a victory for the First Amendment,” attorney Andrews Campbell of Waldoboro said Monday. “It gives us the same rights as everyone else.”

In the lawsuit filed against Corrections Commissioner Martin Magnusson, Campbell was one of the plaintiffs in a case brought by the Maine chapter of the Prison Ministry of Yokefellows International and three inmates.

The state’s reasoning behind the policy was that correspondence between prison volunteers and inmates posed a greater danger of manipulation by prisoners and the bringing in of contraband.

In November, prison officials had declined comment on the lawsuit or the policy because it was pending litigation.

On Monday, Assistant Attorney General Diane Sleek, who represented the Corrections Department in the case, did not immediately return a call to the newspaper for comment on the settlement.

The complaint filed by the Yokefellows and inmates Derek Soucy, Kevin Tardiff and Antonio Abreau sought a declaratory judgment and a preliminary restraining order for temporary and permanent injunctive relief.

The Yokefellow members named as plaintiffs were suing as individuals. The plaintiffs were Edward A. Myers of Walpole, the Rev. William Luger of Georgetown, the Rev. John Daniel McNutt and Raymond Christie, both of Boothbay Harbor, and Campbell.

Yokefellows is an international group that evolved into a prison ministries organization in 1955. It was inspired by the teaching of Quaker preacher D. Elton Trueblood. Yokefellows are committed to the idea that people’s lives are changed through personal discipline and committed small groups where problems and faith are shared.

The plaintiffs alleged that the state violated their state and federal constitutional rights, including their First Amendment rights to free speech, exercise of religion and associational rights; Fourth Amendment rights to freedom from unreasonable search and seizure; and Fourteenth Amendment rights to due process and equal protection clauses.

According to volunteers, another reason prison officials gave for the rule was that volunteers go into parts of the prison that other visitors cannot visit, thereby justifying the ban on volunteers writing to inmates, Campbell had said. He had argued that that rationale simply did not make sense.

In an earlier prison memo, volunteers were banned from sending holiday greeting cards to inmates. That ruling later was clarified, informing volunteers that they could only send commercially produced greeting cards and that they could not include personal messages.

One of the plaintiffs – McNutt, who is pastor of Boothbay Baptist Church – said Monday that the lawsuit forced the state to “deal with the issue rather than sweep it under the rug,” and caused prison officials to realize the policy was not good.

In the agreement, the state rescinded its directive and added a clause that reads: “Correspondence between prisoners and volunteers is to be allowed on the same basis as other general correspondence between prisoners and those in the community. Therefore, it may only be opened or read in accordance with” departmental procedures.

The state will pay Campbell $2,892 in costs and attorney fees as part of the settlement.

“It was really done as a public service,” Campbell said. “The point in this was not to make money, but to assert a fundamental right.”