Family Visits for Inmates Upheld

A Marin County Superior Court judge has halted state prison officials’ plans to end conjugal visits for imprisoned rapists, murderers and other serious offenders.

As a result, Judge Peter Allen Smith, was branded Thursday by Gov. Pete Wilson as “a liberal [who] . . . has ignored the feelings and wishes of the victims and their families [by] siding with rapists, child molesters and murderers.”

The judge on Wednesday agreed with a lawyer who has filed a lawsuit against the state on behalf of prisoners’ families. The incentives of visiting privileges “enhance prison security and make it easier for guards to manage prisoners,” lawyer Michael Satris told Smith.

Smith’s new ruling expands the preliminary injunction he issued in December, which prevented the Department of Corrections from ending overnight visits for child molesters.

The new injunction also orders that the visits be continued for inmates sentenced to death or life without parole, those without parole dates, rapists and other sex offenders, and recently disciplined inmates.

The Department of Corrections had planned to end family visits for those inmates next Tuesday. Lawmakers and victims’ groups had protested that the overnight visits in prison cottages were an unwarranted treat for hard-core criminals.

But Satris said the judge agreed with the inmates’ families that the ban was invalid for two reasons: It amounted to additional punishment after the fact, and it was applied arbitrarily to different crimes.

Unless overturned on appeal, the injunction will continue through the trial on the lawsuit by prisoners’ families. The trial date has not been set.

The governor said the state will appeal Smith’s ruling.

Wilson called Smith’s ruling “an outrageous example of unnecessary judicial interference in the operations of this state.”

“There are literally thousands of people in this state who no longer have the privilege of visiting with their loved ones because some criminal killed their husband or wife, son or daughter,” the governor said in a statement.

Meanwhile, in Sacramento, the Assembly on Thursday approved by a 41-22 vote a bill by Assemblywoman Paula L. Boland (R-Granada Hills) that would permit the Department of Corrections to charge for access to public records. The bill now goes to the state Senate.