Just curious if anyone knows what the situation is with prisoner mail in most states. Is every piece screened, going in and coming out, or are there random checks? While we’re at it, how about phone calls? I ask partly out of curiosity after reading an article about Jason Moss and his relationship with various serial killers (e.g. many wrote him graphic letters, he was allowed to visit John Wayne Gacy and was almost raped by him, etc.), and partly as research for a future short story. All replies appreciated, goodness knows I can’t get ALL my info by watching Oz.
any mail can be read. (Michigan). all are opened (to insure there’s nothing noticably stuffed inside like money or drugs or whatever). Packages - well, they only can come from certain sources (ie mom can’t send you some bedroom slippers for your b’day, she has to order and pay for them from some approved place and then it gets sent).
Phone calls, pretty much same thing (tho’ I think they have to be careful about lawyer’s phone calls.)
there’s too many to screen each and every single one (all the prisoners I knew had boxes and boxes of letters they’d received)
however, also you should keep in mind that information is power, and I"d rather assume there was a high level of ‘trading’ info going on, ('watch so and so’s mail).
I know of one guy who’d got sent up for a short bit, decided that what would really help him adjust to prison, was a steady supply of grass. So, he calls/writes his supplier on the outside…
8 years later, he walks into my office.