[lg policy] Utah prison drops =?windows-1252?Q?=91English-only=92_?=rule during visits to inmates

[Harold Schiffman]

 Utah prison drops ‘English-only’ rule during visits to inmates
 Corrections » Changes relax the rules regulating visits to Utah inmates.

By brooke adams

| The Salt Lake Tribune
First Published Jul 10 2013 01:01 am • Last Updated Jul 10 2013 06:21 pm

For the first time in its history, the Utah Department of Corrections will
allow prison inmates to converse with visitors in languages other than
English.

The policy change is among significant revisions to the prison’s general
visitation policy<http://corrections.utah.gov/index.php/prisons-visitation.html>set
to take effect on August 1, modifications largely aimed at getting rid
of rules based on outdated and overly broad gender stereotypes.
  —

Rules at state prisons run gamut

» New York State allows up to six hour visits, 365 days a year, in its
maximum security units

» North Carolina allows only one visit per week for up to two hours in
maximum security

» California does not limit the number of approved visitors an inmate may
place on his or her list

» Pennsylvania allows inmates to have 40 people on a visitation list

» South Dakota allows only two visitors plus immediate family

» Tennessee requires visitors to wait one year between being removed from
one inmate’s list and added to that of another

» Utah requires all visitors to reapply every year for approval

» Oklahoma prohibits married inmates from receiving visits from friends of
the opposite gender

» New Hampshire prohibits all toys from visiting rooms

Source: Prison Visitation Policies: A Fifty State Survey by Chesa Boudin,
Trevor Stutz and Aaron Littman of Yale Law School, November 2012, available
at http://ssrn.com/abstract=2171412




  One change will allow individuals to be on more than one inmate’s
approved visitation list, a rule that required, for example, parents who
had two children in prison to seek special approval to visit both. Visitors
who are non-immediate family members and want to visit an inmate of the
opposite sex will no longer have to be accompanied by their spouse, the
inmate’s spouse or the inmate’s parents — a requirement that often proved a
logistical hardship.

The prison also will allow unmarried inmates to have more than one
unmarried person of the opposite gender who is not an immediate family
member on his or her approved visitor list. That rule was initially
designed to quell complications — and potential violence — when an inmate
had more than one ongoing relationship with a significant other. But in
practice, the rule kept friends, foster parents and all sorts of other
people from visiting individuals serving sentences at state prisons in
Draper and Gunnison.

Utah appears to be the only state in the nation with an English-only
rule, according
to research conducted last year by three Yale Law School
students<http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2171412>.
Signs at public entrances and in visiting rooms at the prison alerted
visitors that all conversations with inmates were to be conducted only in
English. If another language was used during a visit, officers would
interrupt the conversation and ask participants to speak English or even
end the visit.

John Mejia, legal director for the ACLU of Utah, said the organization
received numerous complaints about the policy from inmates and their family
members — particularly mothers who wanted to speak to their sons or
daughters in their native language.

"That was very concerning to us," Mejia said. "We didn’t see any strong
penological need to have such a rule and we were also concerned that it
might put the prison out of compliance with federal rules regarding
accommodations for people who speak a foreign language. The prison walls
don’t cut you off from our Constitution."

A breakdown of languages spoken by state prison inmates was not available,
but department data shows that about 19 percent of the current inmate
population is Hispanic.

Corrections spokesman Steve Gehrke said that the English-only policy was
initially adopted as a safety measure to ensure officers who monitor visits
could understand conversations between inmates and visitors. Executive
Director Rollin Cook, who took over the top post in April, decided to
change the policy after hearing concerns about it from the ACLU and
discussing it with staff.

Cook said the change strikes a "better balance between the institution’s
security interests and the public’s free speech rights."

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/56572505-78/prison-inmates-policy-rule.html.csp




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