To combat the flow of drugs into prisons, the Oregon Department of Corrections is considering a change to its mail rules that would prohibit inmates from receiving letters written with colored pencils or markers while only permitting white envelopes and paper.
The proposed change comes as state prison officials seek to stop drugs from entering Oregon’s prison system, which has 12 facilities that handled nearly 1 million pieces of mail last year for some 12,000 people in custody. One pathway — but not the only one — is for drugs to enter prisons through the mail, sometimes disguised or shrouded with bright colors on paper and drawings.
“We’re finding so much contraband that is disguised by the use of crayons, colored pencils, colored paper,” Mike Reese, director of the Oregon Department of Corrections, said in an interview with the Capital Chronicle. “And we’re just finding more and more with fentanyl and other drugs.”
But the proposed rule change also has drawn criticism. In the agency’s administrative rule hearing on Monday, Sept. 16, advocates and families of people in custody spoke out against the proposal. They said the change reaches too far and blocks children from sharing their handwritten, colorful drawings with their mothers in custody.