In the
United States Court of Appeals
For the Seventh Circuit
No. 10-3339
D ANA W OODS and E RNEST T OPE,
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
v.
C OMMISSIONER OF THE INDIANA
D EPARTMENT OF C ORRECTIONS,
Defendant-Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Indiana, Indianapolis Division.
No. 1:08-cv-01718-JMS-TAB—Jane E. Magnus-Stinson, Judge.
A RGUED F EBRUARY 24, 2011—D ECIDED JULY 19, 2011
Before B AUER, P OSNER and M ANION, Circuit Judges.
B AUER, Circuit Judge. The plaintiffs are Indiana inmates
who filed a class action lawsuit claiming that the Indiana
Department of Corrections (“IDOC”) violated their
First Amendment Rights by prohibiting them from
(1) advertising for pen-pals and (2) receiving materials
from websites and publications that allow persons to
advertise for pen-pals. District Judge Jane E. Magnus-
2 No. 10-3339
Stinson granted summary judgment in favor of the IDOC
and the plaintiffs appealed. For the reasons set forth
below, we find that the IDOC policy on pen-pals is
constitutional and affirm.
I. BACKGROUND
In November 2005, an IDOC investigator named Todd
Tappy was directed to examine potential links between
pen-pal correspondence and inmate fraud. The investi-
gation was launched as a result of a conversation
the IDOC Commissioner had with family members of
an elderly man who had allegedly been defrauded by
prisoners.
Tappy reviewed Internet pen-pal websites and discov-
ered that 350 inmates of the IDOC had solicited pen-pals
using the sites. He later interviewed several pen-pals
who had corresponded with inmates through the pen-
pal sites. The interviewees reported feeling deceived
after sending money to prisoners who had lied about
their release dates and offenses of conviction. Tappy
reviewed the online profiles of the 350 inmates adver-
tising for pen-pals and found that the majority of these
inmates had indeed misrepresented themselves to the
public in their postings on the sites. He also looked into
the source of funds that were deposited into inmate
trust accounts. Unable to confirm that any of the funds
inmates received from outside the prison came from
persons solicited on the pen-pal sites, at the conclusion
of the investigation, the evidence of financial fraud
No. 10-3339 3
that Tappy gathered remained largely anecdotal.1 Never-
theless, he recommended several measures be taken to
curb the potential for any future fraud by inmates com-
municating with pen-pals.
First, he recommended placing a cap on the amount
of funds allowed in inmate trust accounts. Second, he
recommended implementing a regulation that would
limit the source of trust account funds to inmates’
family members and other authorized individuals.
Third, he recommended that the IDOC prohibit inmates
from soliciting or commercially advertising for money,
goods or services, including a prohibition on advertising
for pen-pals. The IDOC adopted Tappy’s second and
third recommendations. The inmates now challenge
the constitutionality of the latter, arguing that the pro-
hibition against advertising for pen-pals and re-
ceiving materials from the pen-pal sites violates the
First Amendment.
II. DISCUSSION
A. Standard of Review
We review a district court judge’s grant of summary
judgment de novo. Lim v. Trustees of Indiana University,
1
Perhaps the strongest evidence that inmates had used the
sites to induce financial contributions was one female inmate’s
admission that she had acquired two pen-pal fiancés, each
of whom—unbeknownst to the other—sent substantial sums
of money to her on the belief that they would marry
following her release.
4 No. 10-3339
297 F.3d 575, 580 (7th Cir. 2002). The de novo standard
requires a reviewing court to view the facts and draw
all reasonable inferences in favor of the nonmoving
party, here the plaintiffs. Id. In cases such as the one
before us, we are careful to distinguish between “infer-
ences relating to disputed facts and those relating to
disputed matters of professional judgment.” Singer v.
Raemisch, 593 F.3d 529, 534 (7th Cir. 2010). Matters of
professional judgment, including decisions rendered
by prison authorities, are accorded great deference. Id.
B. Constitutionality of the Pen-Pal Policy
As indicated, the plaintiffs claim that the IDOC policy
prohibiting advertising for pen-pals violates their con-
stitutional rights under the First Amendment.
At the outset, we note that courts have upheld the
curtailment of First Amendment rights fairly broadly in
the prison context.2 As the Supreme Court has articulated
the governing standard, “when a prison regulation im-
pinges on inmates’ constitutional rights, the regulation
is valid if it is reasonably related to legitimate peno-
logical interests.” Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78, 89 (1987).
The plaintiffs concede that a policy designed to pre-
vent prisoners from developing relationships with outside
2
See, e.g., Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78 (1987) (upholding a
Missouri prison regulation that prohibited intra-prison corre-
spondence); Singer v. Raemisch, 593 F.3d 529 (7th Cir. 2010)
(upholding a Wisconsin regulation that prohibited prisoners
from playing the game “Dungeons and Dragons”).
No. 10-3339 5
persons only to defraud them by inducing financial
contributions is “obviously a legitimate governmental
objective.” App. Br. at 17. Therefore, the only real ques-
tion for our review is whether the regulation enacted
was reasonably related to the legitimate objective of
curtailing inmate fraud.
Several factors are relevant to the reasonableness
inquiry. First, there must be a “valid, rational connec-
tion” between the regulation and the objective set forth
to justify it. Turner, 482 U.S. at 89. Second, the inmates
must have an alternative means of exercising the re-
stricted right. Id. at 90. Third, the impact of accom-
modating the asserted right on prison staff, other
inmates, and prison resources generally must be consid-
ered. Id. Last, the regulation must not be an “exag-
gerated response” that ignores an alternative which
would accommodate the inmates’ First Amendment
rights at a de minimus cost to legitimate penological in-
terests. Id. at 90-91. The burden is not on the IDOC to
prove the validity of the regulation; rather, it falls to
the inmates to disprove it. Overton v. Bazzetta, 539 U.S.
126, 132 (2003).
1. Existence of a “Valid, Rational Connection” Between
the Regulation and Its Objective
We begin with the first of the Turner factors, which
acts as a threshold matter “regardless which way it cuts.”
Singer, 593 F.3d at 534. As Justice O’Connor wrote in
Turner and Judge Tinder cited in Singer, “[A] regulation
6 No. 10-3339
cannot be sustained where the logical connection
between the regulation and the asserted goal is so remote
as to render the policy arbitrary or irrational.” Turner,
482 U.S. at 89-90.
The plaintiffs’ argument on this point seems to be
that the regulation in question is unnecessary rather
than remote. As argued at page 3 of their reply brief,
“The fraud concern that gave rise to the ban . . . is com-
pletely addressed by safeguards currently in place.”
We will address their argument that the restriction on
advertising for pen-pals is gratuitous in our discussion
of the last Turner factor, which deals with the existence
or absence of a “ready alternative” to the contested reg-
ulation. For now it suffices to say that the plaintiffs
have not directly challenged the regulation as being
remote or arbitrary.
A prohibition on advertising for pen-pals relates
fairly directly to the goal of preventing fraud since it
cuts off the inmates’ access to potential victims. The
plaintiffs have not raised any issue of material fact on
this point. Therefore, summary judgment was appro-
priate with respect to the first factor.
2. Existence of an Alternative Means of Exercising
the Restricted Right
The second Turner factor requires us to examine
whether an alternative means of exercising the plaintiffs’
First Amendment rights remains available to them de-
spite the restriction that has been imposed. The plaintiffs
No. 10-3339 7
concede that on the face of the matter, their First Amend-
ment rights are not seriously impeded by the pen-pal
policy, “given that the [IDOC] allows prisoners to com-
municate with virtually anyone and everyone, provided
they are not obtained through a pen-pal site.” App. Br.
at 23. Though inmates cannot advertise for pen-
pals, they can still send and receive nearly unlimited cor-
respondence. The crux of the plaintiffs’ argument is
that the ample alternative channels of communication
that remain available to them are illusory; inmates such
as those in the instant case may not be able to find
persons in the outside world with whom to communi-
cate without advertising on pen-pal sites.
While we are mindful that some inmates do not main-
tain relationships with family and friends following
their incarceration, it cannot be said that alternative
means of communication do not exist for such inmates.
As deposition testimony in this case revealed, inmates
may obtain pen-pals through various groups that
visit the prison. They may also cultivate contacts in the
outside world through other inmates, their attorneys,
and by their own initiative. Inmates are allowed to
receive newspapers and magazines; nothing prohib-
its them from reaching out to those who may be sym-
pathetic to their plight. As such, we cannot conclude
that the alternative means of communication available
to them are illusory.
Finding that viable alternative means of communica-
tion remain available to IDOC inmates, we move to the
third of the four Turner factors.
8 No. 10-3339
3. Impact of Accommodating the Inmates’ Exercise of
the Restricted Right
The third Turner factor requires us to examine the
impact that voiding the regulation would have on
prison staff, other inmates, and the allocation of prison
resources. Turner, 482 U.S. at 90.
The district court made much of the effect that lifting
the ban might have on the amount of mail IDOC officials
would have to process, citing increased usage of the
Internet in recent years as an indicator of projected
growth in the number of persons interested in Inter-
net solicitation of pen-pals. We find the district court’s
hypothesis that increased Internet usage would lead to
increased use of pen-pal sites and therefore an in-
creased amount of incoming mail to prisons tenuous
at best. While it is undoubtedly true that Internet usage
has increased in recent years, the figures cited do not
appear to have been specific to the prison population;
furthermore, it cannot be reasonably inferred that the
more one uses the Internet, the more one becomes in-
terested in seeking out pen-pals.
More relevant to our inquiry is whether lifting the ban
would re-open a channel of communication that creates
a large potential for fraud to occur. We believe that it
would. The record indicates that Tappy spent significant
time investigating the inmates’ use of pen-pal sites and
interviewing persons who felt they had been defrauded;
this is not the type of activity prison officials should
regularly have to conduct. The results of the investiga-
tion were sufficiently unsettling to warrant the imple-
No. 10-3339 9
mentation of preventive measures against fraud. There-
fore, we find that the IDOC was reasonable in its
belief that, absent a ban on Internet solicitation, some
inmates would continue to exploit the Internet’s broad
reach and relative anonymity for an improper purpose,
including fraud. Not only is such behavior incompatible
with the rehabilitative goals of incarceration, it also
unduly distracts prison officials from the day-to-day
affairs they must manage in order to maintain a safe
atmosphere for everyone in the prison environment. The
Internet is a breeding ground for mischief of the sort
the IDOC Commissioner feared. When prison officials
are rational in their belief that, if left unchecked, an ac-
tivity will lead to fraud, we hold that banning the activity
does not violate inmates’ First Amendment rights.3
4. Existence of a Ready Alternative
The last of the Turner factors asks whether an alterna-
tive to the challenged regulation would fully accom-
modate the inmates’ First Amendment rights at a
de minimus cost to legitimate penological interests. We
disagree with the plaintiffs’ contention that such an
obvious alternative exists.
3
See Singer, 593 F.3d at 536 (holding that although playing
the game “Dungeons and Dragons” had not incited gang
behavior in the past, since it was rational to believe that con-
tinuing to allow inmates to play the game could lead to such
behavior in the future, banning it did not violate the First
Amendment).
10 No. 10-3339
After Tappy reported the results of his investigation,
in addition to banning inmates from advertising for pen-
pals, the IDOC also placed limits on who can put funds
into inmate trust accounts. The plaintiffs argue that
since IDOC inmates may now only receive funds from
non-family members who are enumerated on the in-
mates’ visiting lists, the fraud concern has been
addressed and the pen-pal prohibition is gratuitous.
Certainly the restriction placed on the deposits helps
prevent fraud, but it can hardly be said to eradicate it.
As the IDOC points out, a person on an inmate’s
approved list could act as an intermediary who receives
funds and then deposits them into the inmate’s trust
account. In this scenario, fraud could go quite easily
undetected by prison officials.
In our view, no single regulation can serve as a catch-
all for eliminating the potential for fraud. Though we
agree that the restriction on deposits goes a long way
toward accomplishing the stated goal, we defer to the
judgment of the prison administrators when it comes to
deciding whether a ban on solicitation is also necessary.
This is consistent with our circuit’s precedent of granting
deference to matters of professional judgment by prison
officials. See Singer, 593 F.3d at 534 (quoting Overton,
539 U.S. at 132, for the proposition that “[w]e must
accord substantial deference to the professional judg-
ment of prison administrators, who bear a significant
responsibility for defining the legitimate goals of a cor-
rections system and for determining the most appro-
priate means to accomplish them”).
No. 10-3339 11
We close by noting that constitutional rights are not
eradicated by one’s incarceration; the liberties enjoyed
by the citizenry at large remain available to incarcerated
individuals except to the extent that the exercise of such
liberties is at odds with the objectives and administra-
tion of an effective prison system. Using pen-pal websites
to engage in fraud is antithetical to the rehabilitative
goals of confinement. Here, the IDOC reasonably per-
ceived that continuing to allow inmates to use the sites
would passively enable fraud. The regulation enacted to
prevent it squarely addressed the threat and is therefore
constitutional.
III. CONCLUSION
For the reasons set forth above, we find that the regula-
tion in dispute is reasonably related to the legitimate
penological objective of preventing inmate fraud. Since
the plaintiffs have not managed to overcome the hefty
burden of disproving the validity of the regulation in
their analysis of the Turner factors, we A FFIRM .
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