Prison newspapers are newspapers created within a prison, typically by the inmates.
The first prison newspaper is believed to have appeared in the 19th century in a debtors' prison.[1] Prison reformers in the US created a prison newspaper at the Elmira Reformatory in 1883.[2] It was "carefully assembled not to include items that officials deemed to have a bad influence on the inmates" and was instead intended for rehabilitative purposes.[2] The first inmate-driven paper was created at the Minnesota Correctional Facility in 1887.[3]
A 1935 study, the first on the topic, found that almost half of US prisons had a prison newspaper.[3] The genre reached its height in the 1960s in the United States, at which point circulation was approximately 2 million readers across 250 publications.[1] During this period "active and alert prison reporting" became more common, with inmates highlighting problems within the prison system.[4] The "Pulitzers of prison journalism", the Penal Press Awards, were awarded annually beginning in 1965.[5]
However, they faced issues around freedom of the press, as critiques of prison practices were met with institutional censorship.[1] In 1974, in the US Supreme Court case of Pell v. Procunier, the court ruled to uphold a California state restriction against prison inmates being interviewed face-to-face by the press. Journalists and inmates had contended that this restriction violated the First Amendment.[6] This ruling "largely replaced" earlier precedents supportive of prison reporting; subsequent court decisions also held that "the prison's security interests trumped the free speech rights of inmates" and that prisons could entirely forbid prison newspapers.[1] Similar patterns and tensions emerged in other parts of the world, such as Canada. These pressures resulted in a quick and significant decline in the number of prison newspapers in publication between the 1970s and 1990s, with just six operating in 1998.[3] [1] However, more recently, "alongside a surge in bipartisan interest in criminal justice reform, prison journalism has reemerged and garnered the attention and support of funders, politicians, and the public".[7] As of 2023 there are an estimated 24 prison newspapers in the US.[8]
Early prison newspapers were typically "devoted to inmate activities: sports events, movies and other entertainment, personal items, blood banks, school and organizational activities, hobbies, and the like".[9] Humour was also often featured.[9] Sports remain a popular topic of reporting. Depending on the level of censorship at a particular institution, such papers may carry stories critical of the prison administration. With the modern aging prison population in the US, obituaries have also become a feature.
Challenges within the prison system, including potential reprisals against prison journalists, complicate reporting.[10] The US Federal Bureau of Prisons has an explicit ban on journalism by inmates, while most US states have restrictions that negatively impact journalism from within jails.[11]