Prison cellphones
If asked whether inmates in county and state prisons should be allowed to possess cellphones, most reasonable adults would be inclined to respond with a thumbs down. Individuals convicted of a crime serious enough to land them in a correctional facility should be prohibited from being able to freely contact anyone from the “privacy” of their cell.
Do not think of the prison phone policy as punishment. Think of it for what it really is: protection of the public. It reduces opportunities for felons to stay in easy and quick communication with outside criminal associations and activities.
It is one of the main reasons cellphones are banned in the first place. They are considered contraband when in the hands of inmates and promptly confiscated when found.
Banning them, however, is seldom enough. Some serving time behind bars still manage to get their hands on mobile devices and remain in touch with criminal elements beyond prison walls.
The seriousness of the issue is aptly indicated in the 126 full prison searches conducted in 2022 by the Georgia Department of Corrections. Among the illegal items confiscated were 8,074 cellphones. The number represents only the ones discovered during the shakedowns.
There is another way to fight this illicit communication with the outside, but the federal government is standing in the way. A letter signed by the attorneys general in 22 states imploring congressional leaders to deal with a federal law that prohibits jamming cellphone signals in prisons has gone nowhere.
The attorneys general made it clear why prison facilities should be allowed to block the signals. In their letter they noted that contraband cellphones are used by inmates to arrange, among other things, killings, drug buys and fraud.
Georgia legislators refuse to stand idly by while bureaucrats in Washington twiddle their thumbs. Senate Bill 159, which passed 34-20, prohibits wireless communications and stand-alone electronic devices behind guard lines. The House Public Safety and Homeland Security Committee wants to change the measure to target employees and prison contractors who attempt to smuggle the devices to inmates. An individual convicted of violating the law could face a maximum prison sentence of up to 10 years, double of what it calls for today.
Authorization to jam signals would be a better option, but the state feels it can ill-afford to mimic the snail’s pace of the federal government on such an important issue to public safety.