As part of a growing effort to stop prison telecom monopolies from charging exorbitant fees for calls between prisoners and their families, last year Minnesota became one of the first states to make all phone calls free for prisoners. And to eliminate the kickback system perpetuating the scheme, the state barred its agencies from collecting commissions on prison phone services, as well as on video calling and e-messaging.
But records obtained by us show Minnesota’s Department of Corrections still collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in kickbacks last year from commissions on other prison services private telecom companies controlled — including money transfers, music access, and other entertainment behind bars. All in all, the records suggest the telecom firms brought in nearly $3 million in revenue from an ever-increasing array of nonphone prison services in the state.
Minnesota, which was the fourth state in the country to make the government, not prisoners, pay for phone calls, is a case study in how prison communication companies and their private equity owners have managed to preserve their symbiotic relationship with state corrections agencies despite reforms — at the major expense of incarcerated people and their families.
According to a Minnesota state watchdog agency, under a current prison contract, people in state prisons must pay between $1.06 and $1.99 to listen to a single song on state-issued devices. Under a new contract with another telecom vendor, the cost will increase to up to $2.36 per song — and the state will pocket a bigger cut of the revenue.
“For-profit telecom companies are making hundreds of millions of dollars from incarcerated people and their families, while Minnesota families are going into debt to stay connected with their loved ones through phone calls and video calls,” said Margaret Zadra, Minnesota’s ombudsperson of corrections. “For-profit companies should not be allowed to erode that connection to line their own pockets.”
As digital tablets become increasingly ubiquitous behind bars, criminal justice reform advocates say Wall Street is poised to control and monetize an ever larger share of the daily lives of this captive audience.
“The ideal world for the private equity owners of these companies is every prisoner has one of their tablets, and every one of those tablets is hooked up to the bank account of someone outside of prison that they can just drain,” said Paul Wright, the executive director of the advocacy group Human Rights Defense Center, which for years has led a campaign to lower prison telecom costs.
Hellbound and Down 