## Facts

- Kevin Murphy, a Montana state prisoner who sometimes assisted other inmates with legal matters, wrote to another inmate charged with assaulting a correctional officer.
- The letter offered legal assistance and discussed defense strategy.
- Prison officials intercepted the letter under prison mail rules and disciplined Murphy for “insolence” toward staff and “interference with due process hearings.”
- Murphy sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for declaratory and injunctive relief, claiming the discipline violated the First Amendment, including an asserted right to provide legal assistance to other inmates.
- The district court granted summary judgment to prison officials under Turner v. Safley, finding the restrictions reasonably related to legitimate penological interests.
- The Ninth Circuit reversed, recognizing a First Amendment right to provide legal assistance that warranted greater protection in the Turner analysis.

## Issues

1. Whether prisoners have a special First Amendment right to provide legal assistance to other inmates that receives greater protection than the general standard in Turner v. Safley.
2. Whether courts may increase constitutional protection for inmate correspondence based on the content being legal advice rather than ordinary communication.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court reversed the Ninth Circuit and remanded.
- The Court held that inmates do not have a special First Amendment right to provide legal assistance to fellow inmates that alters or heightens Turner review.
- Restrictions on inmate-to-inmate legal communications are evaluated under Turner’s general rule: a regulation impinging on constitutional rights is valid if reasonably related to legitimate penological interests.
- The Court did not decide whether the specific mail regulation and discipline satisfied Turner on the merits, leaving that for further proceedings.
- A concurrence noted Murphy could still pursue vagueness and overbreadth challenges on remand if properly preserved.

## Legal Principles

- Prisoners’ constitutional rights are limited in scope, and many speech restrictions are permissible when tied to legitimate objectives such as security, order, and rehabilitation.
- Turner v. Safley supplies a single, deferential standard for reviewing prison regulations that burden constitutional rights: the regulation is valid if reasonably related to legitimate penological interests.
- Courts may not create content-based increases in protection within Turner merely because a prisoner’s communication contains legal advice.
- The rule permitting “jailhouse lawyers” in some settings derives from the access-to-courts doctrine, not from a freestanding First Amendment right of the assisting inmate.

## Conclusion

The Court rejected a heightened First Amendment protection for inmate-to-inmate legal advice and required courts to evaluate restrictions on such communications under Turner’s ordinary, deferential “reasonable relation to legitimate penological interests” framework, without elevating scrutiny based on the message’s legal content.


Shaw v. Murphy, 532 U.S. 223 (2001)