Judge blocks inmate Internet law
Associated Press
May. 17, 2003 12:00 AM
A federal judge ruled that a state law forbidding Arizona inmates from appearing on Web sites is unconstitutional, saying the law has no legitimate prison management function.
U.S. District Judge Earl Carroll had issued a preliminary injunction in December blocking the Arizona Department of Corrections from enforcing the law. But on Thursday, he permanently barred its enforcement.
"It's a law that was clearly unconstitutional, where Arizona was reaching way outside the state," trying to regulate what was posted on Web sites in other states and even other countries, said David Fathi, a staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union's National Prison Project.
The ACLU filed the lawsuit on behalf of the Canadian Coalition Against the Death Penalty.
The statute, passed by the Legislature in 2000, made it a misdemeanor for an inmate to communicate with Internet service providers and to send letters to Web sites or to third parties who then forwarded them to Web sites or published them for the inmate.
When corrections officials found out about Web sites with inmate information posted on them, they told the inmate to get the information taken down. If it wasn't removed, inmates were subject to disciplinary detention, extra duty and loss of phone privileges.
"When you don't have many freedoms left, this is serious punishment," Fathi said.
The Department of Corrections already bars direct inmate access to the Internet. But prison officials had argued that the state law prevented fraud and precluded inappropriate contact with the public.
Carroll said existing regulations and statutes already do those things.
The 2000 law is "not rationally related to legitimate penological objectives and are therefore unconstitutional," he said in his ruling.
Gary Phelps, Corrections Department chief of staff, said the law was designed to protect victims.
Arizona has a law against inmates contacting victims or their survivors, and the 2000 law was designed to be an enhancement. It was largely the result of lobbying by Stardust Johnson, the widow of a University of Arizona music professor who was murdered after leaving a church recital.
She was outraged when she came across a Web site her husband's killer used to solicit pen pals.
Phelps, who had not seen Carroll's ruling Friday, said he did not know whether the Department of Corrections would appeal.
www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0517inmatesweb17.html
