The Massachusetts Department of Correction's find someone page sends the public to the VINELink website or its phone line at (866) 277-7477 to locate a person held in one of its facilities, with the person's full first and last name or commitment number. The department adds two cautions: the VINELink site is not run by the department, so questions about it go to VINELink support, and only the Department of Correction participates in the Massachusetts VINE program, which means a county house of correction or jail is outside it. Those county facilities are run by the sheriffs and are listed on the Massachusetts county pages.
Once a person is located, the department's pages take over: how to contact someone by mail, email or phone, how to deposit money, how to set up a phone account, how to visit, and where each prison is. Headquarters, for the offices and divisions in Milford, answers at (508) 422-3300.
- Locate: VINELink online or at (866) 277-7477, by full name or commitment number, for Department of Correction facilities only.
- Contact: letters with the person's full name, commitment number and the prison's complete address, forwarded if the person moved and otherwise returned, every incoming letter opened for inspection; email through Corrlinks; calls through a Securus Technologies account at 1-800-844-6591.
- Money: Access Corrections Secure Deposits, the department's preferred method, online, through the app, by phone at 866-345-1884 with a bilingual representative around the clock, in person at the facility or by mail, in U.S. funds from a U.S. address with a Visa or MasterCard.
- Visits: a pre approved list of up to 20 visitors named by the incarcerated person, each applying on the Visitor Application mailed to the institution, revised four times a year, with the rules of 103 CMR 483, dated August 28, 2026.
Written by SearchSystems.net from Massachusetts's own systems: the Massachusetts Department of Correction Find Someone Housed in a Massachusetts Prison page, the department's Contact Someone in a Massachusetts Prison page, the department's Deposit Money page, the department's Set Up a Phone Account page, the department's Visiting Someone in a Massachusetts Prison guide, 103 CMR 483.00, Visiting Procedures, the department's Locations page, the department's Attorney Verification System for Privileged Mail page, the department's Standard Operating Procedure for Privileged Mail, each read on October 14, 2026 by the SearchSystems editorial team.
The 13 locations
The department's locations page lists 13 facilities, each with a note that holiday and normal visiting schedules change and should be confirmed by phone. Among them are the Boston Pre-Release Center at 430 Canterbury Street, Roslindale, a minimum and pre-release facility for sentenced men, (617) 822-5000; Bridgewater State Hospital at 20 Administration Road, Bridgewater, a medium security facility for civilly committed men and, at times, pretrial detainees sent for competency evaluations, (508) 279-4500; the Lemuel Shattuck Hospital Correctional Unit at 180 Morton Street, Jamaica Plain, a medium security medical unit for state and county men and women, (617) 522-7585; MASAC at Plymouth, in the Myles Standish State Forest, for civilly committed men in a detoxification program of up to 90 days, where visits need an appointment and a background screening that can take several days, (508) 291-2441; the Massachusetts Treatment Center at 30 Administration Road, Bridgewater, for sentenced sex offenders and sexually dangerous persons, (508) 279-8100; MCI-Framingham at 99 Loring Drive, the medium security reception and diagnostic center for women, (508) 532-5100; MCI-Norfolk at 2 Clark Street, the state's largest medium security facility, where every visit is scheduled at least 24 hours ahead by calling 508-660-5900 extension 189, Monday through Friday from 8 to 4, (508) 660-5900; and MCI-Shirley at 104 Harvard Road, medium security for sentenced men, (978) 425-4341, where visits are also booked 24 hours ahead and visitors arrive no more than 30 minutes early.
Letters, email and calls
A letter needs the person's full name and commitment number in the address and the complete address of the prison, found on the locations page; if the person has been released or transferred the department forwards it where it can and otherwise sends it back. All incoming mail is opened for inspection, and outgoing mail may be read under certain conditions. Email runs through Corrlinks, and a phone account for calls from someone in custody is created through Securus Technologies, following the instructions on the Securus site or by calling 1-800-844-6591.
An attorney sending privileged mail uses the Attorney Verification System: the attorney registers for an Attorney Control Number and receives AVS barcodes in sheets of 100, through DOC.AVS@doc.state.ma.us at the department's Milford headquarters, 50 Maple Street.
Deposits through Secure Deposits
Access Corrections and its Secure Deposits service is the department's preferred way to send money to someone in a state prison: online through Access Corrections, through its Android or iOS app, or by telephone deposit, with a Visa or MasterCard, around the clock, with a bilingual representative at 866-345-1884. Money may also be deposited in person at the facility, where funds placed in the Inmate Funds box above $200 carry a seven day hold, or in cash through CashPayToday at 1-844-340-2274, or by mail to Secure Deposits, Massachusetts DOC, P.O.
Box 12486, St. Louis, MO 63132, with no fee, processing within 48 hours of receipt and a ten day hold on checks. Every deposit must be in U.S. funds, and Access Corrections accepts only money orders and checks drawn on U.S. financial institutions and only U.S. addresses.
Visiting: the list, the children and the waits
The incarcerated person names each visitor by submitting the name to the institution, and the visitor fills out the Visitor Application and mails it to that institution, whose address is on the application's fifth page or the locations page; both are told of the approval or denial. The maximum number of pre approved visitors at every institution is 20, whatever the security level, exceeded only at the incarcerated person's request with the Superintendent's written approval, and the list may be revised four times a year.
Visitors carry a valid photo ID: a state driver's license, a passport, a military ID or an official photo card from a state or federal agency, immigration documents included. Children under 18 need no pre approval but come with the parent or legal guardian who has physical custody and is on the list; any other adult submits a Minor Consent Form for the Superintendent's approval, which an incarcerated parent named on the birth certificate may sign, with the birth certificate or hospital record to prove the child's birth and parentage, and the form carries over on a transfer.
A newly committed person may have two visitors and a reasonable number of children while the pre approval process runs, submits a visitor listing within 30 days of admission, and loses those two visitors after 40 business days if they are not approved. A visitor who uses life saving medication or a medical device gets the Superintendent's prior approval on written evidence from a health care professional and declares it at every visit.
A visitor paroled or released from department custody needs the Superintendent's permission, a family member recently released waits six months, another applicant with a prior incarceration waits a year, and a Superintendent may reject anyone with felony convictions on security grounds. Privileges are suspended or removed for violating 103 CMR 483, with notice of the reason, the length and the appeal; passive drug detecting dogs, usually golden or Labrador retrievers on a leash, walk the line of visitors at random intervals and sit to alert.
Privileged mail under the September 2026 procedure
The department's Standard Operating Procedure for Privileged Mail, dated September 2026 and issued under 103 CMR 481, has outgoing privileged mail collected from each housing unit's lockbox daily except Sundays and holidays, with the institution Treasurer giving priority to postage for indigent inmates. Incoming privileged mail is sorted daily by the mailroom officer, never opened there, and may be passed through a fluoroscope for contraband; an Inner Perimeter Security officer logs it, wears gloves changed between pieces, and opens it only in the inmate's presence, after the inmate views the sender's identity, with the inmate signing the logbook and still receiving the mail if declining to sign.
Mail with an AVS barcode is presumed free of contraband and legitimate; mail that looks suspicious for an odor, stain, texture, a substance between the pages, a missing barcode or signs of tampering goes to the Director of Security or a designee for a second opinion, heavier letterhead or colored ink never counting by itself, and only after that second opinion is it photocopied, page by page by hand in the inmate's presence, with the copier glass disinfected, a color photograph taken and confidential incident reports written before the end of the shift.
Reading a Massachusetts result
A VINELink result is the department's own answer for whether a person is in a state prison and which one, and a person not found there is in a county house of correction outside the VINE program, or free. The commitment number carries the letters and the deposits, the institution controls the visiting list and its schedule, and the regulations in 103 CMR 481 and 483 set the rules the Superintendent applies.
Questions about finding an inmate in Massachusetts
Related Massachusetts records
The lookup is one of the Massachusetts records this site covers: the Massachusetts arrest records guide explains what a booking makes public, the court records guide covers the Trial Court files, the sex offender registry guide covers the Sex Offender Registry Board, and the Massachusetts county pages list each sheriff and house of correction.