An organization that provides free books on request to inmates in the Arizona prison system is seeking to overturn new rules restricting who can send books to specific inmates. The Arizona Department of Corrections has authorized only publishers to send books directly to individual inmates, hindering efforts of some nonprofit organizations that mail books to prisons. The department says the change is intended to make more books available to the general prison population rather than a solitary donation to merely one individual inmate. Department attorney Brad Keogh says the state revised policy, prohibiting targeted book donations to inmates, means books will now reach far more inmates in need through general donations that enrich the readily accessible prison libraries.
