On December 1, Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP submitted a friend-of-the-court brief to the New York State Court of Appeals on behalf of The Sentencing Project and seventeen additional organizations. The appeal comes in a suit instituted by family members of New York prisoners and two organizations of criminal defense lawyers, who challenge surcharges imposed on New York State prisoners' telephone calls to their family, loved ones, and counsel. Press reports have calculated the surcharge to make such calls six times more costly than those placed by persons not confined in state custody. The Sentencing Project, a Washington-based think tank and advocacy organization committed to criminal justice reform, urged the Court to consider extensive research by which scholars and correctional professionals have found that prisoners who keep up family ties are less likely to commit crimes once they are released, and that telephone calls are a vital means by which prisoners preserve those bonds, particularly in light of the distant location of many facilities holding prisoners from New York City. Additional friends of the court joining the brief included the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. The brief was prepared by associate Keith M. Donoghue, with assistance from Erin E. Oshiro and Aaron S. Fleisher. Partner Eric A. Tirschwell supervised the project. The appeal is to be argued on January 9, 2007, in Albany.