Mail and Photos at Otisville Correctional Facility

How to Address It

John Smith, 12A3456
Otisville Correctional Facility
57 Sanitorium Road
Otisville, NY 10963-0008

Name and DIN together on the first line. The DIN is the Department Identification Number the state lookup returns, and mail without one cannot be sorted to a person.

No Post Box, and Do Not Invent One

Most New York state prisons publish a P.O. Box for incarcerated mail. Otisville does not. The street address is the address.

That produces two opposite mistakes. Some people hunt for a box that does not exist and end up copying one from another facility. Others assume a box was left off the page and add one. Both go wrong.

Write it exactly as NYSDOCCS publishes it, with the ZIP+4 ending 0008, and nothing else.

The Other Prison in the Village

	Otisville Correctional Facility	FCI Otisville
Run by	New York State	Federal Bureau of Prisons
Address	57 Sanitorium Road	Its own address in the village
Mail rules	The ones on this page	Set by the Bureau of Prisons

Both are in the village of Otisville and share the ZIP prefix 10963. Mail does not cross between them. A letter for someone in federal custody addressed to Sanitorium Road does not get walked over, and the reverse is equally true.

If the sentence came from a New York state court, this page is the right one. If it was a federal case, the Bureau of Prisons publishes its own addressing instructions and they look nothing like these.

What the Envelope Needs

• Full name and DIN on the first line
• 57 Sanitorium Road, then Otisville, NY 10963-0008
• Your full return address, in the top left corner
• Nothing else written on the outside

A letter with no return address is treated as contraband and is not delivered. That is the department’s own wording and it holds statewide.

The Paper Arrives

Mail at Otisville is opened and inspected at the prison and then handed over. Your envelope, your handwriting, your paper.

Many New York county jails now route personal mail to a scanning centre and deliver it as an image on a tablet. State prisons do not.

What the Mailroom Refuses

Published by the department and applying statewide.

Refused	Note
Polaroid photographs	The format itself, whatever the picture shows
Nude photographs
Postage stamps	Do not enclose stamps for a reply
Letters from other people	Third-party mail, with an exception for children
Tape, glue or paste	Including on newspaper clippings
Cash, checks, money orders	Covered below

There is also a paper limit: five pages of printed or photocopied material per letter, with newspaper clippings counting one page each. Legal papers for an active case can exceed it only with the Superintendent’s written permission, obtained in advance, and no more than once every four months.

Photographs

Ordinary printed photographs get through and they are the best thing you can put in an envelope.

Polaroids do not, anywhere in New York, because of the format and not the picture. An instant print has a thick backing that can conceal things, so the category is excluded.

Order prints from a photo service or print them at home on ordinary photo paper, and keep writing on the back to a name and a date.

Money Goes to Miami

Nothing financial goes in the envelope. The inspection is looking for exactly that.

Deposits go to the JPay lockbox, PO Box 531190, Miami, Florida 33153, with a JPay deposit slip, capped at $999.99 per money order and free by post. On a visit day the lockbox inside Otisville takes $50 in cash a day in total.

Note that this is the state prison’s arrangement. The federal prison in the village uses a different deposit system entirely.

Packages Come From Vendors

Families cannot post or carry packages in. Everything arrives directly from an approved vendor by USPS, FedEx or UPS.

The allowance is two non-food packages a year and three food packages a month, food capped at a combined 40 pounds. The department publishes a disapproved vendor list and Directive #4911 carries the detail.

Legal Mail Runs Separately

Mail from a lawyer or a court is privileged under Directive #4421, and it is opened in front of the person it is addressed to, not in the mailroom.

A family member cannot send ordinary mail under a legal label. Trying it puts the letter at risk instead of speeding it up.

On the Six Days You Cannot Visit

Otisville gives a family one day a weekend, set by the surname. The post covers the rest of the week.

Pigeonly prints and sends letters and photos to Otisville with 57 Sanitorium Road, the ZIP+4 and the DIN already in place, so the village with two prisons in it does not end up with your envelope at the wrong one.