A constitutional challenge to the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Department’s policy of banning physical mail (other than legal mail) sent to people incarcerated in the County’s jails.
Filed on behalf of five people incarcerated in San Mateo County jails, several of their family members, and a collective of artists that corresponds with people in jail, ABO Comix v. County of San Mateo seeks to end San Mateo County’s policy prohibiting people incarcerated in its jails from receiving physical mail (other than legal mail). The senders must instead route letters to a private, for-profit company, Smart Communications, which processes the physical mail through its MailGuard system, scanning and storing digital copies of mail for at least seven years—even if its recipient has long been released from jail. The original letters, cards, drawings, and religious and educational materials are destroyed, while the scanned copies are retained in a database that allows the county—and anyone to whom the county has provided login credentials—to monitor, read, and search through mail for any reason, or for no reason at all.
The only way for an incarcerated person to access their mail is to accept Smart Communication’s terms and use a small tablet to read a scanned version of the letter in a public space. Making matters worse, there is no guarantee that a tablet will be available when an incarcerated person wishes to read their mail. The limited availability of the tablets, and the technical problems with them, mean that incarcerated people often cannot access their mail at all.
San Mateo County claims that its ban on physical mail reduces drug use behind bars, but the complaint points to public reporting that similar policies in other states did not lead to a decrease in drug use or overdoses. Additionally, letter-writing has been linked to better outcomes for both the receivers and senders of mail, including reduced stress, closer relationships, and more opportunities upon release.
Audio interview with SJLF Director Sara Haji on the importance of physical mail.
Paper mail conversion practice draws lawsuit from high-profile legal coalition led by Columbia University institute, Electronic Frontier Foundation and Social Justice Legal Foundation
The Trial Impact Project coordinated with Silicon Valley De-Bug, a grassroots partner and nonprofit in San Mateo County that supports the families of incarcerated individuals, to obtain key details about the county’s adoption of MailGuard through a public records request filed in 2021. In 2023, our team partnered with the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Knight First Amendment Institute to file this lawsuit.
For nearly two years, Trial Impact Project, EFF, and Knight have fought to obtain critical discovery from San Mateo County, Smart Communications, and other sheriff’s departments that have adopted similar mail digitization policies throughout the United States. Our skilled team of litigators heads to trial in April 2026 with co-counsel at EFF, Knight, and Hueston Hennigan, ready to prove that the County’s elimination of physical mail is an exaggerated response to a concern about drugs that predominantly enter through other avenues, not the mail.
