PS 1315.07
11/5/99
Page 12
Legal material which co-defendants or co-plaintiffs receive
through special mail or from an attorney through an attorney
visit is subject to inspection for contraband or qualification as
special mail only, and may not be read or copied.
[(2) Except as provided for in paragraph f.(4) of this
section, an inmate may possess another inmate’s legal materials
while assisting the other inmate in the institution’s main law
library and in another location if the Warden so designates.
(a) The assisting inmate may not remove another inmate’s
legal materials, including copies of the legal materials, from
the law library or other designated location. An assisting
inmate is permitted to make handwritten notes and to remove those
notes from the library or other designated location if the notes
do not contain a case caption or document title or the name(s) of
any inmate(s). The assisting inmate may also develop and possess
handwritten drafts of pleadings, so long as the draft pleadings
do not contain a case caption or document title or the name(s) of
any inmate(s). These notes and drafts are not considered to be
the assisting inmate’s legal property, and when the assisting
inmate has these documents outside the law library or other
designated location, they are subject to the property limitations
in § 553.11(a) of this chapter.]
§553.11(a) refers to the Program Statement on Inmate
Personal Property.
[(b) Although the inmate being assisted need not remain
present in the law library or other designated location while the
assistance is being rendered, that inmate is responsible for
providing and retrieving his or her legal materials from the
library or other designated location. Ordinarily, the inmate
must provide and retrieve his or her legal materials during his
or her leisure time. An inmate with an imminent court deadline
may request a brief absence from a scheduled program or work
assignment in order to provide or retrieve legal materials from
an assisting inmate.]
The law library is the most appropriate location for
allowing inmates to assist one another with legal matters
however, the Warden may choose to designate additional locations.
Where it is difficult to use the institution’s main law
library (for example, at a medical facility, a metropolitan
detention center, a metropolitan correctional center, an
administration maximum security facility, an administrative high
security level institution, or in a special housing unit,