Introduction
This is my followup on the situation at El Dorado prison, where some Secular Humanists have been running into resistance in forming an officially recognized group to discuss their beliefs, and which I first brought to the attention of Wichita Atheists at the April 20 meetup. In intervening weeks, I have done much digging, and found that much has already been written. I'll document and summarize that here.

I hope you will join me in pressuring El Dorado prison to grant recognition to the proposed Secular Humanist group, since that is what the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment demands. But I also want to make sure you are informed about who you are supporting. We do have principle on our side, but in practical terms, supporting these prisoners won't win us any friends, considering the especially unsettling things did to land themselves in prison.

The Call-out
On April 19 Stuart Bechman of Atheist Alliance International (AAI) forwarded to me a letter from Robert Richardson asking for help to pressure the El Dorado Correctional Facility, where he is an inmate, to officially recognize a Secular Humanist group with what is termed a "call-out". AAI had already been in contact with another El Dorado inmate, Alex Peña, over the same issue. Peña had already been trying to establish the call-out for over a year, with no luck, and he was set for release in May, so the torch was being passed to Richardson.

The call-out is a form of official recognition for religious groups in prison. It comes with certain benefits. Recognized groups are mentioned to incoming inmates who mark "Other" in the religious preference section of their entrance form. Recognized groups are allowed to leave their cellhouses and gather to discuss their beliefs and teachings. Unrecognized groups, on the other hand, are deemed to be meeting without permission, and can be charged with incitement to riot and thrown into "The Hole" for months. Recognized groups have the ability to hold materials corporately, so books and such can be passed from prisoner to prisoner. Prisoners' individual possessions, however, must be either destroyed or taken out at release; the materials cannot be passed directly to another prisoner.

Some requirements must be met in order to gain a call-out. Two inmates must request the call-out at the same time, using the proper paperwork. Then it must be approved by the prison chaplains corp. If one of the two inmates is released prior to recognition, the petition dies. Such is the case with Peña.

The First Amendment Violations
Richardson (KDOC #90869) describes the situation at El Dorado as one in which Christian messages are ubiquitous, and other religions have been given call-outs, but where the nascent Secular Humanist group is getting the runaround from the all-Christian chaplains corp when they apply for a call-out. Richardson coordinated with three other inmates to request, in writing, permission to meet with one another, and they were sent forms for a new call-out by the facility chaplain. Since they noticed the forms were the same as Peña had filled out months before, they told the chaplains corp that they already had in a formal application. They were then told by Chaplain Bibey that Topeka was "looking into it". Since then, Richardson and his group have tried to meet in the gym, but have been interfered with and stopped from going. Richardson and one new recruit, Richard Clarke, each filed a formal grievance, which have been unanswered so far. Another inmate, Dennis Rice, heard about the Secular Humanist group, and entered a request to join. He was told simply that no such group exists. He was not told who to contact pending formation of the previously-requested call-out, nor even that a call-out request was in process.

To add insult to injury, the prison librarian selectively makes books she doesn't like get "lost" or never show up to begin with. She once bragged about this within earshot of one of the Secular Humanist group members. Her Constitutionally-inappropriate filtering of library materials has kept an abundance of Christian books, while tossing out almost all opposing books.

All this government favoritism for Christianity and against Secular Humanism is a clear violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. We should press the Department of Corrections to correct this violation of the Constitution.

What Richardson Did
Richardson says in his letter that "most of us are here for relatively petty offenses, such as drug-related charges." That may well be true, if applied to the prison population at large. From what I could find, it is not true, however, of Richardson, or any of the other inmates he mentions by name. Their offenses are considerably more unsettling than mere drug-related offenses. You should be aware of them to know who it is that you'll be helping out, should you decide to help out. Practically speaking, fighting this fight won't win us any friends. It may reinforce some very bad stereotypes of evil atheists.

Richardson's name sounded familiar to me from the beginning. So Google to the rescue. It turned out that I knew his name from three separate places, years ago. The first search hits were related to Richardson's defense of KU religious studies professor Paul Mireki, for a tussle Mireki got into with some Intelligent Design proponents back in 2005. Richardson was a leader in KU's Society of Open-Minded Atheists and Agnostics at the time, and the Lawrence newspaper published comments from him. I had followed the Mireki story as it played out.

The second way I knew Richardson's name was via his excellent blog, The Unapologetic Atheist, in which he wrote many eloquent rants on topics you'd expect, given the title. The blogging strangely stopped, and then altogether disappeared around 2006. Now we know it was because of Richardson's legal troubles.

The third way I knew Richardson was that he was just a couple degrees removed from me in a network of friends on an online dating site that we were both members of. In retrospect, I'm glad I only got nothing more than a couple of misfires out of that site. Here's where things get truly creepy. Much has been written about it, particularly in the Lawrence newspaper.

In February 2006, Richardson was arrested and charged with exposing a woman to a life-threatening communicable disease. Richardson was HIV+, and had been diagnosed since 1998. Shortly after the first charge, he was charged again, for a different woman. Then again. In the end, there were at least six women who had been exposed during approximately a one-year time period. Richardson had told five of them he had a "HAART" condition (his made-up acronym for his HIV infection), which would kill him within a few years. He then had unprotected sex with them. When some of them specifically inquired whether he had any STDs, he said no. The remaining woman claimed Richardson had told her he was HIV+, and that she had insisted on using a condom, but that he took it off during sex, without telling her.

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Richardson was convicted and sentenced to prison in Lyon county court, but that conviction was overturned by the Kansas Supreme Court in June 2009. They said the prosecution had not proved specific intent to expose. It had only proven general intent. The statute that he had been charged under was deemed to have required specific intent. Richardson's defense had been that his intent was to live a normal life, despite his HIV, and that normal life included unprotected sex; his intent was not specifically to expose women to HIV. (Note to any young adults reading this: Unprotected sex - let alone promiscuous unprotected sex - is not actually normal.) He also claimed that he thought his viral load was too low (due to successful anti-retroviral drug treatment) to be an exposure danger to the women. Even though the conviction was overturned, Richardson still wrote to AAI from prison, apparently because the Kansas Supreme Court decision didn't apply to his separate Wyandotte county conviction.

As it luckily turns out, from the information I could find, all the women involved have tested negative for HIV. Also, after his arrest, Richardson had "HIV+" tattooed on his chest, so spreading it in prison or after release seems less likely.

According to the Department of Corrections database, Richardson is currently serving for "Expose to Communicable Disease". I was also able to locate in the database some of the people he mentioned by name in his letter. Dennis Rice is in for "Aggravated Criminal Sodomy; w/child less than 14 yoa" and "Aggravated Indecent Liberties/Child less than 14 yoa". Richard Clarke is in for "Aggravated Criminal Sodomy; Child less than 14" and "Aggravated Indecent Liberties/Child less than 14;Fondling". Brandon Lasley is in for "Aggravated Robbery". He also has several items other items on his past criminal record, but none of them are individually all that serious. Alex Peña was not in the database at all. Finally, there is a man mentioned only as "Brown", which is too common a last name to pinpoint one individual in the database.

How to Help
Now that you know who you're being asked to help, I'll understand if you don't want to get your hands dirty with this. Nonetheless, American prisoners, no matter how ugly their crimes, are still protected under the same Constitution as us. And El Dorado Correctional Facility, as a government entity, is checked by the Constitution as well. So I hope you'll help press El Dorado into Constitutional conformance, but I'll understand if you want to pick a different battle.

The office to contact is the Secretary of Corrections in Topeka. Ask for Gloria Geither. She is the Supervisor of Prison Religious Programs. Phone (785) 296-3317, or write her at 900 SW Jackson St, Topeka, KS 66612-1284.

Try to be both polite and firm in your communication. Don't threaten legal action that you're not ready and willing to take on personally. Do express your concerns and what actions could be easily taken by KDOC to correct the situation. Keep it brief and to the point. (Do as I say, not as I have done!)

Some helpful things to mention:

• Torcaso v. Watkins in 1961 established Secular Humanism as deserving of First Amendment rights, the same as any other religious group or belief.
  
• Just as with Bible study, studying Secular Humanism topics is beneficial for reducing recidivism rates, since people who take their chosen ethical teachings very seriously are more likely to actually apply those teachings to everyday life, versus people who are more lackadaisical towards studying ethics.
  
• Secular Humanism will be very easy for KDOC to accommodate, since it requires no special tools, ceremonies, or diet. At most, it requires only a few commonly available, topical books, and a single page printout of the Affirmations of Humanism. The Secular Humanists merely want to meet and discuss what they have read in those books. That shouldn't be too much to ask.
  

AAI has already contacted a number of organizations in Kansas, such as other atheist meetup groups and the Great Plains chapter of Americans United, here in Wichita. Like us, these groups are pressing for a fix to the First Amendment violations at El Dorado Correctional Facility.

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References

KDOC Inmate Database
Robert Richardson (KDOC #90869)

Dennis Rice (KDOC #95249)

Richard Clark (KDOC #90607)

Brandon Lasley (KDOC #88692)

News and Blogs on Richardson Trials, in chronological order
"Resident accused in HIV infection case", February 25, 2006

"Man charged with exposing others to HIV", March 9, 2006

"Suspect faces second HIV exposure charge", March 24, 2006

"Police arrest man for fourth HIV exposure", May 23, 2006

"New charge filed in HIV exposure case", May 24, 2006

"Fourth witness testifies in HIV exposure case", June 7, 2006

"Hearing postponed in HIV exposure case", June 16, 2006

"Trial starts this week in HIV-exposure case", August 15, 2006

"HIV-exposure cases dismissed", August 16, 2006

"HIV case first test of state statute", August 21, 2006

"Judge won't dismiss HIV charges", September 7, 2006

"Trial opens in HIV case", September 27, 2006

"HIV-exposure trial questions man's intent", September 28, 2006

"Expert: Drugs made HIV transmission unlikely", September 29, 2006

"Jurors deciding HIV case", September 29, 2006

"HIV exposure", October 9, 2006

"Kansan among few to be tried for HIV crimes", October 13, 2006

"Prison term given for HIV exposure", November 23, 2006

"Man charged in HIV exposure starts trial", October 13, 2007

"Robert Richardson sentenced in HIV-exposure case", January 17, 2008

"Kansas Supreme Court overturns conviction in HIV case", June 19, 2009

"State v. Richardson, 209 P.3d 696 (Kan. 2009)", Jun 19, 2009

"Kansas Supreme Court Reverses HIV Exposure Conviction, Finding Specific Intent Not Proven", June 22, 2009

Miscellaneous
"Prison's chapel answering prayers", May 3, 2009

"Affirmations of Humanism"

Here are some additional comments from Vickie Stengl, President of the Great Plains chapter of AU...

I have a comment that I would like to throw out there however and that is we should all be aware that religion is obviously a privileged class, as Peggy Knutson has reminded me so may times, especially in prison which I find disturbing. If I understand the "call out" correctly and the form to mark "other" it seems that if you are religious you do not have to jump through these tortuous hoops to meet like minded individuals to discuss your beliefs. Am I wrong regarding this conclusion? Why do other groups have the burden of filling out forms, navigating the system of paperwork and personnel when people of faith are automatically allowed this "privilege"?

Also as heinous as the crimes are I would remind everyone that we have priests walking this earth who have never paid their debt to the children,families and society for the abuse they caused to so many innocent children. I am with you Matthew that these are not "trivial" crimes and no one can excuse what they have done and they should be in prison until they have served their sentences. However, as we all have noted, the state does not have the right to make the process of a "Call out" so difficult and burdensome to these inmates and deny them the privileges they so easily extend to the Christian community of inmates.

I also got word from Vickie that she received a new letter from Richardson. That letter included further allegations. According to him, the warden can approve the call-out at any time. But they've been sitting on it for over a year. Vickie will be passing on information to national AU, and probably also the ACLU. As soon as I get a copy of the new letter, I'll post any new details it contains.

Greetings my name is alex. Alex Pena. One of the guys in your article. I am now free. I would like to chat with you regarding the fight against doc. I wish to help.

Matt--Clearly the Constitution is on your side. The question I have is whether there are any studies actually showing a reduced recidivism rate for either religious groups or secular humanist groups in prison. If so, is there a significant difference between the two? It would be nice to be able to show that starting a secular humanist group would actually be beneficial, rather than just arguing from a position regarding discrimination/equal treatment under the law. We have to pick our battles, and I personally feel this cause would be worth it only if it will actually be helpful in giving prisoners an ethical grounding that will help prevent them from committing further crimes.