A national prisoner rights publisher has sued Dallas County, Sheriff Marian Brown and Chief Deputy Shane Sowell, alleging that jail rules on physical books, magazines and periodicals amount to a near-total ban that violates incarcerated people’s free speech rights. The Human Rights Defense Center filed the federal complaint on September 4 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas.
The lawsuit claims the restrictions violate the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution as well as the Texas Constitution, according to Dallas Observer reporter Hannah Everett. HRDC publishes Prison Legal News and Criminal Legal News, materials the organization says provide incarcerated people with information about legal issues, and it says it tried to work with Dallas County and the sheriff’s office before filing suit. Court records reviewed by PacerMonitor show HRDC is represented by attorneys from O’Melveny & Myers LLP, Thomas S. Leatherbury Law PLLC, and the SMU Dedman School of Law.
The Dallas County Sheriff’s Department has declined to comment, citing the ongoing litigation, per the Observer’s report. HRDC’s lawsuit states that its materials are not accessible on the jail-issued tablets that have replaced much of the facility’s physical mail, and it alleges the current rules leave incarcerated people without due process for challenging denials of reading materials. The suit seeks an end to what it calls censorship of protected speech, along with a process for appealing rejected materials.
Sheriff Points to Security Concerns and Tablet Access
Sheriff Brown has said some inmates used physical books to compromise the security operation of jail doors, according to the same Observer account. In a Facebook video cited in that reporting, Brown said books are available on inmate-issued tablets every day, and the sheriff’s department has removed inmate access to physical books in the jail…