By James Hannah
The Associated Press

DAYTON, Ohio - Kiosks that enable prison inmates to quickly get up-to-date information about laws and court cases have gotten a thumbs-up from defense lawyers and prisoner advocates.

The service from LexisNexis enables prisons to provide required access to legal information and do away with law books, which are more expensive, quickly outdated and easily damaged, according to prisons that use the database.

LexisNexis, based in Dayton, has installed computer kiosks in four prisons and jails in Hawaii and five in California. The kiosk consists of a touch-screen computer monitor covered in shatterproof glass inside a steel box bolted to a wall.

"It would seem a better system than relying on antiquated law books," said Charles Carbone, a lawyer with California Prison Focus, which advocates for prisoners' rights.

Prisons had to be assured that the kiosks, manufactured by Touch Sonic Technologies in Santa Rosa, Calif., would not pose a danger of broken glass that could be used as weapons, said Bill Carter, vice president and managing director of LexisNexis' western market center in Dallas.

"We've taken a crowbar to it. It doesn't shatter," Carter said.

The kiosks in Riverside County correctional facilities in California have worked out well and replaced law books, sheriff's Capt. Alan Flanary said.

Since the 1970s, the U.S. Supreme Court has mandated that inmates have access to legal information.

Inmates navigate the database by touching different parts of the monitor screen, which includes a keypad. The Internet-based public records database provides access to more than 4.6 billion documents from more than 30,000 news, business and legal information sources.

Flanary said the inmates seem to prefer the kiosks because they simply can type in a topic and retrieve information.

"You see this wall of books facing you, and you don't know where to begin," he said.

The service for the five California correctional facilities costs $94,400 a year. Money inmates spend at prison commissaries for candy bars and other items is used to pay for the kiosks.

In Ohio, inmates do legal research primarily through law books, said JoEllen Culp, a state prisons spokeswoman.

Prisoners have no access to the Internet or any electronic legal resources, but the state is considering buying legal information on compact discs, she said.

The computers will ensure prisoners' research is more reliable, enabling them to better assist in their defense, said John Rion, former president of the Ohio Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

LexisNexis is negotiating with prisons and jails in five other states to install the kiosks.