Inmate pen-pal sites rile victims

Roberta Roper has lived through the horrific reality of her daughter’s brutal murder in an abandoned Maryland farmhouse.

Now, 30 years later, Roper is face-toface with the imprisoned killer — this time, by way of a third-party website that helps prisoners attract contact with the outside world.

“I find it downright offensive,” Roper said. “It compounds everything (victims) have to endure.”

Jerry Lee Beatty, convicted of murdering Stephanie Roper in 1982, is one of thousands of inmates whose profiles are featured on pen-pal websites like Voiceforinmates. com, GoodPrisoner.com, and Writeaprisoner. com. The sites charge an annual fee, anywhere from $15 to $60, to host an inmate’s profile. Pen pals discover the prisoners online and correspondence is sent via mail.

Adam Lovell, president of Writeaprisoner.com, says his website offers prisoners hope, and society a better chance for reduced recidivism and better-behaved criminals.

“I really am asking for a second chance ... my family has either died or left me after 25 years of imprisonment,” says Beatty’s profile message on Voiceforinmates.com. “I need finances for attorneys, art supplies, and some everyday essentials.”

Legal debate over the extent to which inmates should be allowed to communicate through the use of social networking websites has surfaced in several states. Laws in Florida, Indiana, and Missouri, for example, ban the use of pen-pal websites to solicit communication for inmates, citing the potential for abuse and fraud.

Lovell said the market for such websites is becoming crowded by startups who see the sites as potential moneymakers.

“I’ve seen dozens of these websites pop up and go away,” Lovell said. “People think they’re going to make a lot of money on these things.”

Russell Butler, executive director of the Maryland Crime Victim’s Resource Center — founded by Roberta Roper — said the rights of victims should not be ignored.

“I have a problem with mechanisms that would allow inmates the ability to violate a citizen’s or victim’s right to privacy,” Butler said.

David Fathi, director of the American Civil Liberties Union National Prison Project, said an inmate’s right of correspondence has been established for a long time. If a victim’s family member is afraid of seeing a criminal online, he offered a solution: “Don’t Google them.”