COLUMBIA, SC — A federal judge has thrown out the ruling a lawsuit an effort to overturn the South Carolina prison system’s ban on in-person interviews with prisoners and the recording of telephone conversations for broadcast.
The American Civil Liberties Union wanted to air a podcast with a death row inmate and also represents a transgender woman who killed her mother when she was 13, who was diagnosed with gender dysphoria and who is suing the state prison system for denying her care.
But in a ruling last week, federal Judge Jacquelyn Austin said the government can restrict free speech rights in areas it controls that are not open to the public, and that the media has no special rights to access prisoners.
The prison system allows prisoners and journalists to exchange letters.
The South Carolina Department of Corrections “stands by its longstanding policy of allowing inmates to answer interview questions in writing. We are grateful that the courts have recognized and upheld this,” agency spokeswoman Chrysti Shain said in a statement.
The ACLU plans to appeal the judge’s decision to dismiss the lawsuit. The organization said hearing from prisoners is especially important as the state plans to his first execution in just over 13 years later this month, with another five years to go until the spring of 2025.
“We continue to believe that the people of South Carolina have the right to hear what is happening in our prisons and to hear from the people who experience it,” said Allen Chaney, legal director of the ACLU of South Carolina.
The policy has been in place for nearly 25 years. Prison officials said it protects victims of crimes by preventing their perpetrators from gaining fame and notoriety, and keeps prisons safer by preventing inmates from sending coded messages through interviews.
The ACLU named two inmates in its lawsuit. Sofia Cano, a transgender woman, wants to discuss her lawsuit over the denial of care, prison conditions and the treatment of LGBTQ+ people behind bars.
The other is death row inmate Marion Bowman, convicted of killing a woman in 2001 and burning her body in the trunk of a car. Bowman’s attorneys argued during the trial that someone else pulled the trigger.
Bowman wants to tell his story as he prepares to ask the governor for clemency to commute his death sentence to life in prison. The state Supreme Court Bowman has planned He would be the third inmate to die as executions resume, meaning he could be sentenced to death sometime in late November or early December.
The Department of Corrections occasionally allows cameras into prisons for stories about specific programs, such as prisoners recording books for their children or learning job skills. But media must agree to use only first names and not show faces, tattoos or anything else that could identify a prisoner.
Although they are not allowed to appear on camera, prison officials said inmates in South Carolina are allowed to write to anyone, including reporters, and that inmates who cannot afford stamps or stationery can still get them.
Inmates can also allow reporters to be placed on their phone list, as long as their own words are not recorded and rebroadcast. The Associated Press interviewed one of the two prisoners who murdered four fellow prisoners in this manner in 2017.
Also named in the ACLU lawsuit was Alex Murdaugh, the former attorney who served two life sentences for the murder of his wife and son. Murdaugh got into trouble because his recorded phone call with his lawyer was played as part of a documentary.
According to prison officials, Murdaugh lost his privileges and his attorney was warned that he could lose unsupervised access to inmate phone calls if he did it again, but the media outlet faced no consequences.