Visiting in Mississippi (MDOC)

This guide covers MDOC’s state prisons. Mississippi also holds state-sentenced people in two privately operated prisons and fifteen county-run regional facilities that set their own visiting rules — the state overview explains how to tell which kind holds a person.

Getting on the List

The application begins on the inside. The incarcerated person requests the Application for Visiting Privileges and sends it to each person they want to visit — MDOC does not post the form online or mail it out, so the only way to get one is from the person inside. The completed form goes back to the address printed on it, where a case manager reviews it. Approval is not announced: MDOC’s published guidance is to call the facility to confirm a visitor was approved, and to wait for that confirmation before making travel plans.

Each person may list ten visitors. The list is created during reception and classification; immediate family stay on it permanently unless removed, while others drop off unless renewed. A visitor may be on only one person’s list unless they are immediate family of more than one. A spouse must provide a certified copy of the marriage license.

Published exclusions:

• People with felony convictions cannot visit except where an immediate-family relationship is established — and then only with the superintendent’s written permission, which must be shown at every visit
• People on probation, parole, or conditional release cannot visit without a verifiable family relationship and the superintendent’s written approval
• A child who is a victim of the person’s offense, and anyone an investigation shows poses a threat
• Current and former MDOC staff, contractors, and volunteers cannot visit people they met through that work; current employees may visit only immediate family with proof

MDOC publishes no appeal for an ordinary denial. A person who is barred may petition for a written waiver.

Minors

A visitor under 18 enters with a parent or legal guardian. Visitors 16 and 17 need a photo ID showing their date of birth and must be on the approved list; children 15 and under bring a legible birth certificate. Children count toward the five-visitor-per-visit limit, are pat-searched in front of their parents, and follow the same dress code. One infant diaper bag is allowed — up to four diapers, two bottles, one change of clothes, a pacifier, wipes in a clear bag, and any necessary infant medication. MDOC runs no standing children’s visiting program, though individual prisons have held one-off family-day events.

Scheduling

This is where Mississippi differs from most states: MDOC posts no visiting schedule — not online, and not on the facility pages. The published instruction is to contact the specific facility for its days, hours, and arrangements, and it is the incarcerated person’s responsibility to tell visitors the schedule. There is no online scheduling system. No visits happen during reception and classification, an intake period of about two weeks to 45 days.

What MDOC does publish is how often and how long visits run, set by custody level:

• Minimum custody: contact visits, 3 to 5 hours, up to four times a month
• Medium custody: contact visits, 3 to 5 hours, twice a month
• Close custody: non-contact, up to one hour, once a month (with a two-hour contact visit with immediate family on a fifth weekend)
• Death row: two hours, non-contact, twice a month
• Long-term segregation: up to one hour, non-contact, once a quarter

A maximum of five visitors (including children) may attend at once; the Youthful Offender Unit allows four.

Contact Rules

Contact visits happen in a cafeteria-style setting. The published affection rules: a brief kiss and embrace on entry and exit, holding hands, sitting with an arm around the shoulders or waist, and hands resting anywhere not considered sexual. Non-contact visits — used for close custody, death row, and segregation — happen through a barrier with a phone or speaker.

Mississippi ran the country’s first prison conjugal-visit program, begun at Parchman in the early 1900s, and was the last state to keep one: extended family visits ended in September 2013 and conjugal visits ended February 1, 2014. No such visits exist today.

What to Wear

The published dress code, which applies to every visitor including children:

• Shirts and closed outdoor shoes required; underwear required, including a bra for women
• No tank, crop, sleeveless, or strapless tops, no spaghetti straps, no bare midriffs
• Nothing see-through, overly tight, or revealing — no yoga pants, leggings, spandex, hip-huggers, jogging or biking shorts, mini-skirts, or cutoffs
• Shorts must reach the knee; skirts and dresses no shorter than one inch above the knee, with no slit above the knee when seated
• No hats or head coverings except for religious reasons
• Jewelry limited to a wedding ring, a religious medallion, and a medical-alert bracelet; no body-piercing jewelry

Officers turn visitors away for improper dress, and a dress-code violation carries a published one-year suspension.

ID and Entry

Visitors 18 and older present a valid government photo ID — a driver’s license, state ID, or passport. Everyone signs the visitor log and has a hand stamped, then passes a search: a frisk, an electronic or body scanner, and possibly an ion scan, with strip searches when circumstances warrant and vehicle searches on the property. Drug-detection dogs may be in use at any prison.

Phones, wallets, purses, tobacco, cameras, and money stay locked in the vehicle. Visits are cashless — prepaid debit cards for vending machines are sold in the visiting area. Car keys are surrendered at the visitor center. Prescription medication a visitor must keep on them requires advance written approval from the area warden with a doctor’s statement.

No Video Visits at State Prisons

MDOC publishes no video-visiting program for its state prisons — phone and tablet messaging are the remote channels, covered in Phone & Video Calls. (Some facilities holding out-of-state people, like the CoreCivic-run Tallahatchie facility at Tutwiler, do offer tablet video visits under their own vendor.)

Regional and Private Facilities

MDOC’s statewide rules above apply to state prisons only. The two privately operated prisons (East Mississippi at Meridian, Wilkinson County at Woodville) and the fifteen county-run regional facilities set their own visiting schedules and procedures, and some use different phone and money vendors. The MDOC facilities map lists every regional facility with its phone number — calling the facility that holds the person is the way to get its rules.

If a Visitor Is Suspended

A suspension comes with written notice to both the visitor and the incarcerated person, stating the reason and the length. MDOC publishes a suspension schedule: six months for attempting to visit on a non-visiting day or possessing tobacco; one year for a dress-code violation or visiting under the influence; eighteen months for a falsified identification or application; two years for smuggling or possessing contraband, which can also bring a permanent ban; and permanent for a crime committed during a visit, sexual activity, leaving children unattended, or aiding an escape. A banned visitor may petition for a written waiver.

Verify Before Acting

For the general, nationwide overview of this topic, see the national guide: Visiting Basics.