New Rules Further Isolate Prisoners
A litany of restrictive new guidelines recently imposed by the Mich. Dept. of Corrections (DOC), dictate who may or may not visit a prisoner, and make more difficult the already complicated visitation process. These changes will result in fewer opportunities for prisoners to see family and friends, and will prohibit some members of inmates' families from visiting at all.
These regulations, which came out of the DOC, were approved by Governor Engler's office without first going through the state legislature.
One part of the new visitation policy in Mich. prisons prohibits minors from visiting any inmate except a parent, step-parent, or grandparent. And then that minor must be accompanied by a legal guardian or immediate family member.
Another rule calls for prisoners to provide a visitor list including immediate family members and no more than ten other people. The individuals who can visit a prisoner are then limited to the names on that list, and visitors can only be on one prisoner's list at a time (lists may only be changed once every six months).
A third change stipulates that any inmate cited for two controlled substance violations (that means being caught twice with any non-approved drug), may be denied all visits as long as they remain in prison, with no appeal process.
A fourth change prohibits all former prisoners from visiting anyone in prison except immediate family members.
The implications of these rules for prisoners are potentially grave. For instance, an inmate may no longer receive visits from brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews or cousins under the age of 18.
In some cases - such as those where an inmate has agreed to an open adoption in the best interest of their child - it means terminating a parent/child relationship. This is the case for inmate Stacy Barker, the mother of an 11-year-old daughter. Barker, when imprisoned, voluntary terminated her parental rights to allow her daughter to be adopted by Ann Arbor residents Marlene Ross and John Taylor. Since the adoption over five years ago, the girl has been brought to visit Barker nearly every week. The new rules prohibit this.
Three lawsuits, filed on behalf of prisoners and their supporters on the outside, have failed to stop the new regulations. The cases have called their implementation both a procedural violation of state regulations and a violation of prisoners' constitutional rights to see family and friends on the outside. All three cases were denied by judges and all are being appealed.
"For all prisoners, particularly for women prisoners, the result [of the new rules] is devastating," Michael Barnhart, one of the two attorneys that brought the case raising constitutional questions in federal court, told AGENDA. "The Department of Corrections recognizes that contact between family and inmates is critical to their being able to survive in prison. . . . It's a totally ill-conceived, ill-thought-out approach to solving I don't know which problems."
To protest the new regulations, write to your State Representative (Liz Brater or Mary Schroer), State Senator Alma Wheeler Smith, and Gov. John Engler - all at State Capítol Bldg., Lansing, MI 48909. To get involved in the campaign for prisoners' rights call Penny Ryder at American Friends Service Committee: 761-8283.