State prison ban on hardcovers threatens to close Texas inmate book project

As the Texas Department of Criminal Justice prepares to institute a ban on the kinds of books that can be mailed to inmates in its custody, nonprofits that work to provide inmates with books face a new reality. 

Last month, TDCJ announced in a bulletin that it had revised its longstanding policy allowing books to be mailed to inmates in the agency's custody. Starting on April 1, TDCJ will no longer accept hardcover or used books that are donated to inmates. All books sent to TDCJ facilities must be softcover and in new or "like new" condition, meaning "no tears or stains," according to the agency's bulletin. TDCJ attributed the rule revision to what it said was a "rise in contraband smuggled into correctional facilities through books."

"In many cases, contraband is found hidden inside hard covers and bindings, or pages are soaked in the substance," TDCJ wrote in February. "All of these are difficult for staff and technology to detect, posing serious safety risks to employees and incarcerated individuals."

Scott Odierno, a coordinator at the Inside Books Project, an Austin-based volunteer-run project that mails books to Texas inmates, says the restriction on hardcover and used books could pose existential problems for both the group and inmates it works with. 

"We're going to unfortunately send fewer books, and not as many books as often as requested," Odierno told Chron. 

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Many of the books inmates request, often textbooks or reference books, are hard or impossible to find in new, non-hardback formats. While TDCJ told Chron that Inside Books is still welcome to donate books in accordance with the new rule, Odierno said buying books would quickly become a logistical and financial nightmare for the group. Inside Books mails roughly 3,000 titles a month to inmates, and relies mostly on donations from the public. Roughly 80 percent of donations are either hardcover books or used paperbacks. 

"If we're forced to start buying thousands of books every month, we just can't afford it, we won't be able to send people what they're looking for," Odierno said. "We would probably wind up having to stop doing what we're doing in a year or two. It wouldn't be sustainable."

Founded in 1998, Inside Books is the largest prison book project in Texas and one of several organizations that mails books to inmates in state prisons. Odierno said that Inside Books hasn't been able to get clear answers on what spurred the policy from TDCJ. TDCJ said it has responded to emails from Inside Books and held a Zoom call with other advocacy groups. Odierno said subsequent emails to TDCJ officials have gone unanswered.

"We've been trying to sit down and talk with them about it and they're just not responding to any of our emails," Odierno told Chron. "They're basically saying that this is a crisis and they need to crack down on the books, but they're not giving any evidence of it beyond like one or two anecdotes."

In an emailed statement to Chron, TDCJ spokeswoman Amanda Hernandez said the agency had found drugs hidden in hardcover book spines, glued into bindings and soaked into pages in order to smuggle them into prisons. 

"In 2025 alone, we discovered 385 books that contained narcotics in our mailrooms, and this is just what staff were able to detect," Hernandez said. 

TDCJ provided Chron with three images that the agency said are examples of drugs being smuggled in via books in the past two weeks. One shows a book with a positive test for PCP sitting on top of it. Another image shows a copy of a tabletop role-playing game book called "Random Encounters" that TDCJ says was sprayed with PCP. Another shows a gloved TDCJ employee holding a page that appears to be soaked in what the agency said in an email was PCP residue. 

Odierno conceded that there may be isolated incidents of contraband being hidden in books, but maintained that in nearly 30 years of operation, Inside Books has never mailed anything in violation of TDCJ's policies.

"We actually check every book twice when we get it initially. We go through every book and look at it," Odierno said. "If there's anything in it like random papers or whatever, we take it out and then before we mail it out, we check it a second time."

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Organizations like Inside Books provide a critical lifeline to Texas inmates whose families can't afford to send them books, as well as those who have no familial support at all. Many, but not all, inmate requests are related to educational pursuits or learning a trade, according to Odierno 

"Some people just want a novel to read, but we get a lot of people also that want books that are educational," Odierno said. "They wanna learn a trade so that when they get out of prison they can get a job. People want legal resources, books in Spanish, all those things that aren't just like pulp fiction that they're not able to purchase." 

Odierno also pointed out that many inmates need resources to assist in their legal defenses, something that Inside Books provides. According to an estimate from the Innocence Project of Texas, anywhere between 3,000 to 9,000 Texas inmates in state prisons  at any given time were wrongfully convicted. 

While TDCJ pointed out that Texas inmates have access to prison libraries, Odierno said many of those books are subject to content restrictions. TDCJ already bans thousands of books based on content that the agency says represents security concerns, though that rule is so broad that it encompasses everything from map books to classics of children's literature. Titles that are allowed in facility libraries often in the public domain and don't always have practical value to inmates. 

"You can't get anything like science or psychology or anything like that that's anywhere nearly up to date," Odierno said. "To get anything decent, you have to pay for it, and it's restricted what's available." 

Currently, inmates can access digital books through tablets provided by Secerus, a prison technology firm that contracts with TDCJ and also runs an online portal that allows inmates to send emails to the outside world. But Odierno said those books cost money, and replacing a tablet can cost at least $140. That's a high price for Texas inmates, who work jobs in prison but are often paid nothing at all.

"It sounds like a great thing and there are good things on the tablets, but once again, if you don't have the money, you can't buy anything on it, you can't get a new one," Odierno said. 

Other states, too, have begun further restricting book donations to people in their jails. Earlier this year, Arkansas attempted to ban inmates from getting direct shipments of books, magazines or other physical media entirely. Besides helping inmates learn while incarcerated, a good book can be a crutch for those in Texas prisons. 

"You're in a controlled environment where you're surrounded by people all the time," Odierno said. "A book helps you escape that environment." 

Editor's note: This article has been updated to reflect that TDCJ will allow the submission of used books in "like-new condition" without "tears or stains" for prisoner use. It has also been updated with additional context regarding the photos provided by TDCJ and to reflect that Inside Books participated in a conference call with the department regarding its new book rules. Also, TDCJ said the three books in the photos were suspected of having been contaminated with narcotics.