Slashdot Mirror
FCC Can't Cap the Cost of Cross-State Prison Phone Calls, Court Rules (theverge.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: The Federal Communications Commission does not have the authority to cap the cost of prison and jail phone calls within states, an appeals court ruled in a decision today, dealing a massive blow to inmates and their advocates who have spent years litigating caps on the cost of such calls. Over several years, the FCC, under Democratic leadership, moved to cap the cost of calls for inmates. Activists argued that prisoners were effectively being extorted by private companies charging exorbitant rates -- a move that benefited private prisons and the states that got cuts of the revenue. Some of those states joined with companies in appealing the FCC's rules. The agency first moved to cap rates across state lines, and then, later, within states. Today, the court ruled that the FCC had overstepped when it attempted to regulate the price of calls within states. In the majority opinion, the court left little wiggle room for advocates of price-capping, with the possible exception of the cross-state caps, which are a minority of calls made by inmates. The opinion vacated not only the agency's proposed caps for in-state calls, but said the agency also lacked justification to require reports on video calling services. It also vacated a provision that would ban site commission payments.
It's not the lawyers, it's the families. Many of them struggle with technical issues, and almost all of them struggle with cost issues. Many inmates rely on their families to send them the money to make calls to maintain family ties. This makes that much harder.
>"This is about whether a federal agency can regulate purely intrastate activity. The FCC's rules capping costs for state-to-state calls stand."
+1 Insightful
Bingo. It has nothing to do with if we think the rates are fair or not. It has to do with the autonomy of the States. If you don't like it in your State, complain to your State, not the Fed.
It is really, really hard for many to swallow the concept that we are are the "United States of America" and not the "Federal State of America."
This isn't about calling lawyers. This is about inmates keeping in touch with their families. Many states, including California, ship inmates to out of state prisons, where it hard for their families to visit. Putting even more barriers between these inmates and their families is idiotic, since there is plenty of evidence that family bonds reduce recidivism.
Flippant statements like "just get a virtual phone number" are not constructive. If these people had the wherewithal to do that, they wouldn't be in prison in the first place. These are dysfunctional people on the bottom rung of society. We shouldn't be trying to kick them even lower.
The people running the prisons know damn well what they are doing. They profit from squeezing money from desperate families, and they profit even more from the high recidivism rates that keep their facilities occupied.