In re Short

dissenting in part:

First: I agree that it is not the business of the superior court to redraft a defective prison regulation.

Second: I do not believe the present regulation violates the Constitution. The strict policy applied to letters from attorneys and public officials need not be applied to mail in court envelopes. Communications from a court to a litigant are neither private nor confidential. A counterpart will be in the court’s file as a public record. It was not unreasonable for the director to conclude that communications will be received by inmates more promptly, efficiently and economically if the incoming mail can be inspected and passed on to the addressees without having to arrange a face-to-face meeting between the inmate addressee and a designated official for each incoming court envelope.

Petitioner, a prisoner at California Mens Colony, sought, by a petition for a writ of habeas corpus, to attack the validity of a regulation relating to mail privileges of prisoners, adopted by the Director of the Department of Corrections. 1 The regulation attacked provides as follows:

It is admitted that an envelope, addressed to petitioner, bearing the return address of the County Clerk of San Luis Obispo County, had been opened by a prison official, acting under that regulation, 2 in the absence of petitioner. It is the contention of petitioner that he had a constitutional and statutory right to be present when an envelope addressed to him, bearing the return address of a court, was opened. To secure recognition of that right, he petitioned the trial court for a writ of habeas; the petition was granted, the court including in its order the language of an amended regulation which the director was ordered to adopt.. The Department of Corrections has appealed. We modify the order and affirm it as modified.

It is urged that we reverse the order on two grounds: (1) That the present regulation is constitutionally valid; and (2) That, in any event, the trial court should…