![]() Those facilities have either limited or cut off in-person visitation entirely to ensure that the video-visitation venture can support itself, bring in revenue, or both.įrye’s comments are telling. That’s what you’re seeing at some of the county jails around the state. “Because this is such new technology, many of the companies providing it are pressuring correctional facilities to strongly encourage video visitation. “We agreed to the cut in audio commissions and to forgo the video commissions because the other option would have been to strongly push inmates into using video visitation instead receiving in-person visits from their families,” Frye said. While the video visitation industry often claims that correctional facilities alone decide to limit in-person visits, the language in Securus’s contracts suggested otherwise, and Frye has now confirmed our fears: DOC spokesman Cathy Frye told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, “We do not, however, want it to become a replacement for face-to-face visits.”īut according to the DOC’s Frye, Securus does not market its video system as a supplement for families who have difficulty visiting in-person. Thankfully, the Arkansas Department of Correction will be implementing Securus video visitation as a supplement and not a replacement. In addition to leading the video visitation industry, Securus’s video visitation contracts are unique because they often explicitly require the elimination of in-person family visits. Our January 2015 report on the video visitation industry found that most states that have large video visitation programs contract with JPay. While Arkansas will not be the first state to adopt video visitation, it is the first state that we know of to contract with Securus for video visitation services. You might remember Securus as it’s one of the private companies that dominates the prison phone industry and leads the for-profit video visitation industry. Arkansas DOC to implement Securus video visits Arkansas DOC will be first state prison system with Securus video visitsĪccording to an article published yesterday in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, the Arkansas Department of Correction has approved a contract with Securus Technologies.
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