Several telephone companies that serve prisons are facing a lawsuit by Millicorp, parent company of ConsCallHome.com, a controversial call routing service that reduces the cost of prisoner phone calls. Securus Technologies, one of the prison telcos named in the suit, has petitioned the FCC to ban such call routing services, which the company said threaten security and public safety (CD Sept 2 p5). The Millicorp suit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida sought $75,000 in damages, plus declaratory and injunctive relief. Millicorp alleged that Securus, Global Tel Link, T-Netix and Evercom Systems committed common law tortious interference and civil conspiracy to commit tortious interference when they blocked calls to ConsCallHome. The telcos’ actions violate the 1934 Communications Act and 1996 Telecom Act, as well as various state unfair and deceptive trade practices acts and consumer protection laws, Millicorp said. “What we are trying to do is provide a cost effective solution for family members whose loved ones are incarcerated,” President Timothy Meade said. “Paying upwards of $20 for a 15 minute phone call is a burden that our customers just cannot afford. The prison telephone providers are, as our lawsuit explains, simply put, not only inappropriately blocking these calls but they are also taking outrageous advantage of this targeted group of people with their monopolistic practices.” Stephanie Joyce, an Arent Fox attorney representing Securus, said the lawsuit is “wholly without merit.”
Texas no longer will be the only state without payphone service for prison inmates. The Board of Criminal Justice awarded an Embarq-Securus Technologies partnership a seven- year contract to provide prepaid and collect-call services to inmates in 106 Texas prisons. Embarq will provide phones and lines, while Securus provides the digital security technology. The contract could generate $86 million gross annually, about $600 million over the life of the agreement, state officials said.
A Florida state appeals court reversed a Corrections Department decision to award an inmate payphone contract to Securus Technologies. The First Florida Court of Appeals ruled that the department violated the due process rights of Verizon Business and Global Tel-Link when it rejected their challenges to the award. The companies contested the action, citing conflict of interest because the agency’s secretary had awarded the contract, testified on behalf of Securus during the protest hearings and then denied the bid challenges. The department also ignored its own administrative procedures for reviewing bids, they said. The court (Case 1D07-4603) agreed with the conflict claim, saying there was an inherent conflict when the agency secretary ruled on his own testimony in the bid challenges and then judged the fairness of his own initial decision. The court said the secretary referred to his own testimony to support his denial of the bid challenges. The court said the companies were denied their legal right to have their challenges decided by an impartial tribunal. The court reversed the denial of the challenges, remanding the case to the state agency for appointment of a neutral third party to handle the bid challenges.
The Los Angeles Times reports that Mexico's government is preparing to open bidding on the largest infrastructure project in its history, a $4-billion seaport on Mexico's Baja peninsula, that would link the Pacific Ocean to the U.S. heartland. Vessels bearing shipping containers from Asia would offload them at the new port where they would be taken over newly constructed rail lines to the U.S. (Los Angeles Times, dated 03/25/08, available at http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-mexport25mar25,1,5870690.story)
Few deny there’s growing prevalence of CD home copying, given soaring increase in sales of CD-R blank media. But impact on sales of packaged music and what to do about CD dubbing were issues debated Fri. at International Recording Media Assn. (IRMA) marketing summit in N.Y.C.