by Ameelio Staff
Our jails are filled with people who haven’t been convicted of the crime with which they’ve been charged. They’re there because they can’t afford bail.
Once in jail, it can cost up to $25 for a 15-minute phone call. Such exorbitant fees prohibit people from calling family members and witnesses who can help them build their defense.In result, most of those individuals plead guilty, are convicted and serve longer sentences than those who are not detained pretrial.
This injustice is only a piece of the total harm caused by private prison communications.
The prison phone system is a $1.2 billion industry controlled by Securus Technologies and Global Tel-Link Corp that pulls its profits from the wallets of low-income Americans.
States and local prison systems grant exclusive contracts to these private companies in exchange for commissions. The companies, in turn, hike up fees to recoup what they have paid in kickbacks. State coffers, and the balance sheets of the private equity firms who own prison telecom expand as poor families pay the ransom demanded to maintain contact with their loved ones.
One in 3 of these families go into debt because of this system.
And now prisons and jails have prohibited in-person visitation and limited access to phone calls to mitigate the spread of the coronavirus. People who are incarcerated are resigned to their cells for up to 23 hours a day with little or no ability to contact family members or other support systems.
Such contact drastically reduces recidivism. Yet it’s inaccessible.
Ameelio (ameelio.org) makes connecting with incarcerated loved ones free and simple. We launched our first product, Letters, as a response to COVID-19 prison visitation suspensions across the country. Users of our web and mobile apps can send free hard-copy letters, photos, and postcards to any incarcerated person in the U.S. criminal justice system.
We also developed Letters for Organizations, a paid option for criminal justice organizations. Our partners use Letters for Organizations to send bulk mail to prisons and jails, to conduct targeted mailing campaigns for recruitment, and to manage volunteers engaged in letter-writing.
We’ll soon disrupt the prison telecommunications industry through a suite of communications tools, including the nation’s first free video calling software.
But for now, we’re bringing families together one letter at a time.
“I’ll never forget the sound a letter makes when it slides through your cell door,” Richard, a formerly incarcerated user, said. “When I got a letter, the joy it gave me, it could last me a week.”