New prison mail policy costly to families — emotionally and financially

The feeling of holding a physical piece of mail created by a loved one is “like no other,” according to Joe Barela, a father of three from Albuquerque.

His family has always supported him with visits, mail, and phone calls during his time in and out of prison since 1996.

In his 13-by-7-foot cell at the Penitentiary of New Mexico, Barela hangs pictures on a wall, but only within the designated spot the guards allow him.

Prayers, drawings and other small messages from his three children surround a large drawing of Azrael, the cat owned by the evil wizard Gargamel in the 1980s television show “The Smurfs.”

The drawing was by his fiancee, Amy Gonzales. He proposed six months ago.

“I tell her that I put it on my fridge,” he says with a laugh. “I don’t have a fridge, but that’s where I would put it, if I did have a fridge.”

The New Mexico Corrections Department on Dec. 29 told prisoners’ families that it will be banning physical mail in prisons, and directed them to send their letters to a private company, Securus, in Florida that creates photocopies and sends them to the prisons. Securus is the same company that operates phones in the state’s prisons and developed a voice recognition program that extracts “voice prints” from prisoners’ calls.

The department said the change is because of incidents where contraband material was smuggled in through the mail. Department spokesperson Eric Harrison said the contractor processing the mail will charge the state $3.50 for each prisoner in the state’s prisons, at the beginning of every month. There is no other payment required by the company, Harrison said.

There were 5,588 people in state prisons as of Wednesday, Jan. 19, according to the Department. That means Securus would make $27,940 this month.

If the prison population in New Mexico stayed the same over the course of the next year, Securus would make $335,280 photocopying mail.

But the new policy creates new problems for loved ones sending mail. Gonzales said she tries to send Barela at least two pictures per month, and sometimes they require a larger, more expensive envelope. One of her recent envelopes was returned because there’s now a prohibition on mail consisting of cardboard or rigid parchment that can’t run through the scanner used by Securus. 

Barela said he filed an informal complaint about the mail. He said prisoners shouldn’t be subject to collective punishment because of the actions of a few.

“If somebody wants to mess it up, … take their mail,” Barela said. “Why are you going to take my mail when I’m not doing such a thing, you know?”

The American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico opposes the policy because it violates people’s basic humanity, said Denali Wilson, a staff attorney.

Wilson pointed out that people in the free world are able to keep in touch in many ways, and some might even ask, “Who uses the mail anyway?”

The answer, she said, is prisoners.

“Baked into the design of prison is isolating people from their supports, which means that mail has been and continues to be one of the few remaining lifelines that people in prison have,” Wilson said. “And now, with this policy, that’s even being chipped away.”

Barela says he is one of the lucky prisoners able to keep in touch with family. Others in the prison, he said, often are not even aware they are receiving letters from family because prison officials do not tell them when mail addressed to them gets rejected.

“I cherish those — everybody does,” Barela said. “It’s not only me, it’s everybody in here.”

He’s having multiple issues with prison mail under the new policy, and said the situation depresses him, because mail is one thing a prisoner really looks forward to.

Prison officials do not tell prisoners when a piece of mail has been rejected, or whether it’s been returned to sender, Barela said.

“We don’t know what happens with our mail,” Barela said.

It’s also affecting other parts of Barela’s life. His sister has power of attorney on his bank account. She has to send him information about his bank account, like his transaction history and tax documents. But prison officials under the new policy require him to send those records to be reviewed and copied by Securus in Florida, which he says is unreasonable.

Gonzales sends him pictures of their children and drawings they make for him. He said his children want to draw him things using crayons and markers, but the family had to tell them to only use pens with black or blue ink, because of state policy.

“It’s just out of hand,” he said. “It’s really getting to the point where it’s like, how are we supposed to keep in contact with our family?”