Alabama- Alabama Corrections Commissioner Donal Campbell, in a little noticed order three months ago, banned publications or mail sent to inmates that contain sexually explicit material or nudity.

The ban includes Playboy and other magazines showing nudity or sexually explicit conduct, Department of Corrections spokesman Brian Corbett said Wednesday.

Publications are now banned if they have any “depictions of nudity or sexually explicit conduct on a routine or regular basis or promotes itself based upon depictions in the case of individual one-time issues,” the amended regulation says.

It defines nudity as a “pictorial depiction where genitals or female breasts are exposed.”

Publications that contain nudity “illustrative or medical, educational, or anthropological content may be excluded from the definition,” the regulation says.

Inmates’ mail already is screened by a prison mail clerk. A warden could review the mail if a question arises about it.

Campbell confirmed the change in a television interview Tuesday night on Alabama Public Television’s For the Record.

Corbett said Campbell amended prison regulations on Nov. 17 to make the change, putting in place a policy he used in Tennessee prisons before joining Gov. Bob Riley’s administration.

“This is an update to existing regulations mainly because Commissioner Campbell feels that pornography is not in the best interest of employees or prison operations – or inmates for that matter,” Corbett said.

Prior to Campbell’s arrival, Corbett said some “gentlemen’s magazines were allowed with certain restrictions – no homosexuality, no bestiality, no child pornography. This just bars it all.”

It’s unclear how the order reduced the mail delivery to prisons. The system has more than 27,000 inmates.

“If each one received a piece of mail a day, that’s a large volume of mail for us to screen,” Corbett said.