Ministry Sues OKDOC For Access To Inmates
The Oklahoma Department of Corrections’ refusal to allow a Christian ministry access to send Bibles, books about Jesus Christ and other religious materials to inmates has sparked a federal lawsuit, according to a story at Beliefnet.com.
Wingspread Christian Ministries, headquartered in Prairie Grove, Ark., and operated by Illinois-based Evangelists for Christ Inc., filed the lawsuit Wednesday (Feb. 11) in U.S. District Court in Muskogee. Prison restrictions on prisoners’ correspondence violate the First and 14th Amendments of the U.S. Constitution and Oklahoma’s Religious Freedom Act, the 12-page lawsuit petition claims. “Restricting Wingspread’s freedom of speech and religion is not only harmful to our constitutional rights, it is also very harmful to those within prison walls in need of spiritual sustenance,” said John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, a Charlottesville, Va.-based civil liberties organization, which represents the plaintiffs … Wingspread sends similar religious materials to prisoners in Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Kansas, Louisiana, New York and Texas but “has not encountered restrictions upon and impediments to its ministry similar to those encountered in Oklahoma,” the lawsuit states.
According to the suit, Oklahoma prison regulations mandate that “all orders for publications will be made directly to the publisher of the material or to a legitimate bookstore.” The regulation does not allow a ministry to send Bibles or other religious materials; only a publisher, bookstore or book dealer may do so, according to the plaintiffs.