'Frustrating and heartbreaking': Prison letters are still being destroyed

All letters sent to those in NSW prisons are being photocopied and then shredded, and the state government has ignored a tech solution to the issue.

For Sarah*, writing letters to her incarcerated husband is one of the main ways to stay connected with him.

The pair regularly exchange handwritten letters. Sarah keeps a notepad nearby and writes down something that she would’ve usually texted her husband, and then includes these in the mail.

She says her husband will often receive her letter and save it up for the end of the day.

“You can write so much more in a letter than you can say in a 10 minute phone call,” Sarah says.

“It’s something deep inside, knowing the person you love has touched this and written it. You can’t hug them, so it means so much.”

But under a recent New South Wales Corrections policy, every letter that Sarah writes to her husband is photocopied, often poorly, before being destroyed and thrown out.

“After a whole day he’ll go to read my letter and it hasn’t been scanned correctly,” she says. “It’s frustrating and heartbreaking.”

‘Incredibly frustrating’

The NSW government passed the Crimes (Administration of Sentences) Amendment (Inmate Mail) regulation 2020 shortly after the onset of the Covid pandemic, when visits to prisons in the state were suspended.

It appeared to be in response to concerns that prohibited goods and drugs may be included in the mail. Following the new regulation, then-NSW Corrections Commissioner Peter Severin issued guidance to prison staff that all mail be photocopied then destroyed, with no people in prison to receive any physical mail.

This policy has continued in the years since, with the NSW Inspector of Custodial Services flooded with complaints about it, and concerns over poor photocopying making letters unreadable.

Sarah says that photocopied mail is often left unreadable, can sometimes be photocopied diagonally, have the bottom lines cut off, or half of the letter missing vertically. She says one of her letters was photocopied for her husband with a guard’s hand scanned over the page.

“It’s really demoralising,” she says. “Sometimes you’re writing important things about decisions for the both of you, or you’ve had a disagreement about something or you’re telling them how much you love them. To think those messages aren’t getting through, it’s incredibly frustrating.

“It puts you off sending letters because you’re putting all this effort into it and they’re just destroying it.”

Earlier this year the NSW Inspector of Custodial Services said that the practice of destroying prison mail must end “immediately”, and that the state government should move to obtain legal advice over whether this practice was lawful.

This recommendation has been rejected by Corrective Services NSW, which has backed the continuation of the practice. “Preventing contraband from entering correctional centres is crucial for the maintenance of good order and security in CSNSW custody,” CSNSW said in a letter to Justice Action earlier this year.

“The destruction of original mail is a necessary and significant disruption to the entry of contraband into correctional centres.”

The Inspector said that in 2019-20, mail was not even listed as a complaint made once to official visitors. In 2020-21 it was the third most recorded complaints, and in the following year it was the second most.

“It has been disappointing to observe correctional centre staff and management take so little care with inmate mail given the significant additional obstacles inmates have faced to maintain contact with family and friends during the pandemic,” the Inspector said in the report.

“We consider that the destruction of inmate mail should cease entirely. The persistent implementation issues mean we cannot support the continuation of this practice, even if it should be found to be lawful.”

The discovery of contraband in mail in prisons has increased rapidly despite this new policy. In 2020-21 there were 37 instances of contraband being found in mail. In 2021-22, following implementation of the new practice, there were 260 instances, followed by 159 in the following year.

There are similar regulations in place in Victoria allowing for the photocopying and destruction of mail in prisons. Under section 47CA of the Corrections Act, prison staff are allowed to make a copy of a letter and then dispose of the original.

The regulations do note that it is “critical” that the decision to photocopy and destroy mail has a “justification” as it engages a number of human rights under the Victorian Charter.

Alternatives rejected

Justice Action has been campaigning for the NSW government to reverse its policy, and has presented a number of alternative options aiming to waylay security concerns while ensuring those in prison can be sent physical mail from the community.

The organisation said the destruction of mail is an “unprecedented deprivation of a prisoner’s basic entitlement to receive the original letters and envelopes addressed to them”.

“Timely delivery of mail is important for prisoners to maintain contact with family and friends, to receive time-sensitive information, to plan and prepare for release and to maintain their mental health,” Justice Action said in a report on the issue.

“Delays and denial of access to original letters can cause significant harm to mental health with some prisoners reporting the fear their loved ones had abandoned them when letters hadn’t arrived.”

The state government is aware of a solution to the problem that would ensure security is upheld and contraband is not smuggled into prisons while also ensuring that original mail can be provided to those in prison.

Justice Action has pointed to the VeroVision Mail Screener, which is in use in more than 100 prisons in the US, as a cost-effective method to end the practice while ensuring security is upheld.

These scanners can detect drugs on the mail without destroying it, allowing prison authorities to discover what drugs were being attempted to be brought in, and to who, in order to offer targeted interventions and support.

It has been estimated that one of these scanners would cost about $US150,000.

Justice Action has written to Corrective Services NSW acting commissioner Leon Taylor about the technology.

In response, the acting commissioner confirmed the agency was aware of the solution, but that it would not be conducting even a trial of it.

*Names have been changed