Email or send mail to an adult in jail

eMessaging

King County uses the Securus eMessaging service for jail residents. This service is similar to email. You need to set up a prepaid account through Securus to send messages to adults at the Seattle and Kent facilities. Jail staff will screen your message. If approved, staff will release the message to the resident's assigned computer tablet. The jail resident can read and respond to the message on their tablet. You may send photos as attachments.

The cost of sending an eMessage is set by Securus. 

Learn more about this service

Postal mail

All mail must meet facility rules. To keep people in jail safe, we limit the kinds of mail we accept at our detention facilities. This also helps ensure fair treatment to everyone in our custody. Jail staff open and search all non-legal mail for prohibited items and content. We do so to stop criminal activity and to keep our facilities secure. 

• Anybody in jail found in possession of prohibited items will have the item taken away. They may also face penalties for having received prohibited items from you.
• All mail must be delivered through the U.S. Postal Service. Items delivered from any other service, including UPS, FedEx, or Amazon delivery, will be denied and returned to sender.
• Correspondence between people in custody is prohibited and may cause the loss of mail privileges. This includes using a third party, like a family member or friend, to try to deliver a letter to another person in jail (including at other secure detention facilities).

Legal mail and published materials such as books and magazines are handled differently. You can find more information about legal mail and publications further down this page.

Guidelines and prohibited items

To keep everybody in our custody safe and secure, we limit the items we accept at our facilities. You must follow these guidelines, or your mail will be returned to sender:

• No mail that is racist, inflammatory, sexually suggestive or sexually explicit. This includes nude or semi-nude photos, even of babies and children.
• No letters or photos with gang symbols or any type of hand gestures.
• No photos showing suspected illegal activity. 

Prohibited content

Any writing, publication, photograph or drawing that shows or explains:

• Inflammatory, racist or content/materials targeting a protected class
• Instructions for escape, riot or the disruption of jail security
• Jeopardizing the security or safety of others
• How to make or use a weapon
• Boxing, wrestling, martial arts, tactical maneuvers, etc.
• Any type of hand gestures or gang-suspected activities or graphics
• 'R' and 'X' rated materials
• Acts of violence
• Nudity or partial nudity
• Sexual or sexually explicit
• Tattooing procedure
• Criminal activity
• Third-party mail (forwarding or facilitating correspondence between two or more incarcerated individuals, regardless of location)
• Resident-to-resident mail, regardless of physical location

Letters

All letters to adult jail residents must be mailed to:

P.O. Box 831, Lebanon, MO 65536

This is the address that family members and friends should use to send mail to a jail resident. Rules for attorneys are different. See below

All letters must be:

• Written on white paper
• Written using black or blue ink
• Mailed in a white envelope with your name and return address clearly written and visible
• Addressed to the jail resident using first and last name and the resident's 10-digit booking number

Photographs are allowed if they do not include nude or semi-nude subjects, or any of the prohibited content listed on this page.

Prohibited mail items

You may not send any of the following items to residents in custody:

• Money orders (visit this page to learn how to send money to a jail resident)
• Pages torn from books
• Clothing items
• Food items
• Phone cards
• No items other than written letters and photographs are allowed.

How to send mail

• The FULL, 10-DIGIT BOOKING NUMBER MUST BE WRITTEN ON THE ENVELOPE, or it will be returned.
• After the mail is received at the P.O. Box (Securus Digital Mail Center) it will be scanned and uploaded to the resident’s tablet or sent to a kiosk for them to read, depending on their housing location and privileges. If the resident does not have a tablet or access to a kiosk, the mail will be printed and hand delivered to them.
• Properly address the envelope to avoid delays or returning to sender.
• Pictures and drawings are allowed. They will be scanned and delivered to the tablet/kiosk or printed and given to the resident.
• If an item cannot be scanned, it will be returned to sender. This includes paper that is larger than 8.5 x 11 inches and all non-paper items.
• All packages and certified mail will be returned to sender.
• If you are sending mail and wish to have the original returned to you, you must include a self-addressed, stamped envelope included with the original mail.
• Jail rules regarding mail are still enforced. Content that is sexually explicit and content violating safety and security rules will be rejected.
• All physical mail will be destroyed 60 days after it is scanned.
• Once released from DAJD custody, the resident will have 60 days to log into https://reentry.securustech.net/home to review or print mail they received while in custody. After 60 days, it will be deleted.

Legal mail and publications

Legal mail and publications (newspapers, magazines, books) should still be mailed to the facility.

Legal mail

If you are an attorney with legal mail, do not send it to the P.O. Box listed above. If you do, it will be opened and processed. Send approved legal mail directly to the facility where your client is housed.

Publications

Paperback books and magazines can be sent from a publisher, distributor, or online book seller as long as the items are shipped via the U.S. Postal Service. Items shipped via other delivery services such as UPS, FedEx, or Amazon delivery will be denied and returned to sender. Books that are stored or shipped from a personal residence are not considered online book sellers. Items sent from an online marketplace, such as Amazon or Facebook marketplaces, are prohibited.

Publications that aren't allowed:

• Hardcover books
• Urban fiction or street lit (a literary genre containing excessive profanity, graphic sex, and extreme violence)
• Any publications with restricted content that isn't allowed in letters to residents

Where to send legal mail and publications

To send mail to an adult at the King County Correctional Facility (Seattle jail), use this address: 

Full name (name the person is booked under)

B/A number (book of arrest) 

500 Fifth Ave. 

Seattle, WA 98104

To send mail to an adult at the Maleng Regional Justice Center (Kent jail), use this address: 

Full name (name the person is booked under)

B/A number (book of arrest) 

620 W. James St. 

Kent, WA 98032