Hot Pursuit

Seeing photographs or watching videos of inmates locked up in Minnesota’s prison system or any images of prison won’t be happening anytime soon. 
The Minnesota Department of Corrections has placed a camera ban for any prison interviews conducted by the news media. In changing the policy in February, corrections officials say it is meant to shield crime victims from harmful images of their assailants and remove the prospect of images circulating on the Internet as inmates make the transition back to everyday life.
Corrections officials are now labeling cameras as contraband, which seems totally absurd. 
If news organizations like the Times want access to inmates, we’ll be forced to leave our cameras at the door. Just for the record, inmates still have the option to consent or deny any interview. For example, we have been trying to interview a child molester for several months, but each time he denies our request.
As you can imagine, the move does not sit well with news organizations, especially television stations that rely primarily on video to tell stories. Journalism advocacy groups have shared a concern that barring cameras from prisons would only push inmates further into the growing, faceless mass of the state’s incarcerated population. 
Mark Anfinson, the attorney for the Minnesota Newspaper Association, says the public doesn’t know enough about them, who they are, how they got there and how they think. Society needs to know more because of the magnitude of the problem, he contends.
It boils down to this. It is simply bad public policy to make inmates even more invisible than they already are.  
In our case with the newspaper, being banned from using cameras won’t prevent the presses from rolling. We rely almost solely on the printed word. Mugshots of inmates and public records of their crimes will still be made available to us. 
But it’s important for us to have the option to share photographs of the subjects we’re interviewing with our readers. 
I always feel if something isn’t broken, why fix it? This could easily be made the argument in this situation. Incredibly, this ban has nothing to do with any embarrassing or damaging event or story done by a media outlet. 
We agree with critics that say this is reckless bureaucracy in full swing. The public will lose out by not having a free press on which to rely for impartial information. The biggest losers in all of this are not journalists, but rather prisoners who are silenced. This ban should be immediately reversed. 
People, including journalists, should be extra sensitive to crime victims and the traumatic experiences they have endured at the hands of criminals. We’re not about wanting victims to relive the horrible crimes all over again. But we also don’t feel that outweighs the importance of being allowed camera access in prisons.
Inmates have the constitutional right to talk to the media. The Supreme Court has already granted inmates free speech rights. The state’s latest effort to block the media from utilizing cameras could easily end up being a great First Amendment argument to resolve in court.
It’s time for corrections officials to go in hot pursuit of achieving sensibility in leaving the camera rule like it has been for years.