arch/ive/ief (2000 - 2005)

From: Bork

The Mount Olive Correctional Complex / WV Dept of Corrections inmate regulations call for a 90 day Loss of Privileges for an inmate's name being found on the Internet through search engines.

My husband Joseph Lavigne Jr., a falsely convicted inmate of Mount Olive Correctional Complex is currently punished under this regulation and has been informed that his punishment will be renewed if his name is not eliminated in sources found on the Internet (two of which were explicitly mentioned).

Although he has been unable to write to his family or anyone on the outside except to ask for the removal of his name and address, he expressed in one letter how isolating this has been. " I cannot call you right now because of the LOP [Loss of Privileges].This LOP of mine is a good example of what's wrong here. I am being punished for something I did not do, again."

I am asking for help in stopping punishment of all prisoners under this rule. As prisoners are allowed no direct access to the Internet, this regulation essentially holds the prisoner responsible for the action of others. The inmates are being used as "hostages" for the behavior of others. Additionally it serves to censor those who wish to use the internet as a forum for speech about the inmates case but do not wish to see harm to the inmate, thus violating First Amendment guarantees. It serves as an isolating factor by not allowing people to share an inmates' name and location. And finally it serves to attempt to censor news sources who have written or who wish to write about the prisoner and where he is being held. Censorship of the press is another constitutional aspect to this regulation and, I suspect the courts would agree possibly the most disturbing.

The regulation also leaves the inmate especially vulnerable to others. It would allow the inmate's enemies to put up websites with the inmate's name and location for the explicit purpose of causing punishment. "Loss of Privileges" is not a minor punishment. The inmates of Mount Olive Correctional Complex, a maximum-security facility, are incarcerated for exceptionally long sentences: many are there for life. The loss of all outside visitation, access to news from television or radio, library visits, and all other privileges is particularly disorientating and stressful. For them to suffer such a loss due to something that they have no control over is particularly senseless and painful. And for those inmates with some hope of release, it is capricious, disempowering and unlikely to teach anything positive that would allow successful reintegration into society.

One site explicitly cited for censorship is an article from the magazine Justice Denied. At this time the article mentioning my husband is in their archive section. To hold my husband's wellbeing as hostage in order to censor what this magazine wishes to publish or has already published is reprehensible and unconstitutional. Freedom of the press is one of the foundations of American society. For the MOCC regulation to attempt to regulate the press in this manner is contemptible. Another site is a personal website of mine that is devoted to my and my husband's cases, which even the West Virginia Supreme Court ruled were so inextricably intertwined that they could not consider mine without considering his. The website is mine - not my husbands, put on the internet to speak what I wish to say about what has happened in my life, and yet he is being punished for its' content. And I am being told it will continue unless I censor what I say. Other sites mention his name as well, and while not explicitly cited by the prison authorities, as long as this inhumane and kafkaesque regulation stands, my husband or any other inmate in a similar situation could suffer administrative "loss of privileges" simply for being written about beyond prison walls.

Again, I am asking for any aid you are willing to provide help stop this injustice immediately. Letters, faxes, phone calls, and emails of outrage directed to the Mount Olive Correctional Complex warden, the West Virginia Department of Corrections, and the Governor of West Virginia Bob Wise will hopefully put enough pressure on the system to change. Please help. We must demand that all inmates, currently being subjected to punishment due to this rule be immediately released from their punishment and that the regulation itself be repealed. Contact information for these individuals is:

Commissioner Jim Rubenstein
WVDOC Central Office, State Capitol Complex
112 California Ave. Bldg. 4, Room 300
Charleston, WV 25305
(304) 558-2036 Phone (304) 558-5934 Fax

Warden, MOCC 1 Mountainside Way
Mt. Olive, West Virginia 25185
(phone) 442-7213 (fax) 442-7225

Governor Bob Wise
http://www.state.wv.us/governor/New_eform.cfm
1900 Kanawha Boulevard, E., Charleston, WV 25305
Phone Toll-Free: 1-888-438-2731

Please spread the word of what is happening to everyone you know. Thank you for your help and solidarity on this issue.

Respectfully,

Jamie Loughner