Federal Court Grants HRDC Preliminary Injunction Against Mail Censorship at New Mexico Jail
by Matt Clarke
On March 6, 2026, the United States District Court for the District of New Mexico granted the Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC)—the publisher of Prison Legal News, Criminal Legal News, and several books—a preliminary injunction (PI) against Bernalillo County, New Mexico. The PI prohibits the censorship or rejection of HRDC publications and correspondence at the Bernalillo County Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Albuquerque except under limited circumstances.
As PLN reported, the jail interecepted over 160 items that HRDC mailed after switching to a digital mail system in 2025. The suit was filed in January 2026, accusing the County of violating a 2015 settlement with HRDC in an earlier suit that stopped jailers from banning soft-cover books. [See: PLN, Jan. 2026, p.14.]
HRDC is being represented by its in-house attorney, Jonathan P. Picard of Lake Worth, Florida, and San Francisco, California-based attorneys Ernest Galvan and Benjamin Bien-Kahn of Rosen Bien Galvan and Grunfeld, LLP.
The PI prohibits the censorship or rejection of publications and correspondence being sent to people incarcerated at the jail unless it is based on a legitimate penological interest under the factors set out in Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78 (1987). The PI requires defendants, which include the county, County Manager Cindy Chavez, Warden Steven Smith, and Deputy Wardens Rosanne Otero and Reyna McCann, to give written notice of any undelivered mail to HRDC to be postmarked within 5 business days of the rejection decision, and afford HRDC an opportunity to appeal to a jail official not involved in the rejection decision within 30 days of receipt of the notice. The PI was signed by United States District Judge William P. Johnson.
Preliminary injunctions like this are extremely rare and usually signal that the plaintiff has an overwhelmingly favorable case. See: Hum. Rts. Def. Ctr., USDC (D. N.M.), Case No. 1:25-cv-01208
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