Pennsylvania is among a growing number of states restricting the media's access to prison inmates, according to a recent nationwide survey.
Nine states now bar face-to-face interviews with inmates, up from six in 1998, the Society of Professional Journalists found.
The other states are Alabama, Arizona, California, Idaho, Michigan, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Wyoming won't arrange interviews with specific inmates, the society found.
Wyoming's law is so strict that officials there can't release any inmate information - including photos of outlaw Butch Cassidy from the time he spent in state prison, though he is thought to have died in a shoot-out in Bolivia in 1908.
Some will reconsider on a case-by-case basis, said society spokeswoman Sarah Shrode. And in most cases reporters can eventually get on cooperating inmates' visitation lists - but that often takes months.
Two years ago, the society found face-to-face interviews banned by Arizona, California, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas and Mississippi.
Policies vary widely.
Arizona allows only phone interviews. On the other hand, Texas bans phone interviews - but allows face-to-face contact.
North Carolina has among the fewest restrictions on telephone and in-person interviews, including the use of television or still cameras.
California helped trigger the trend toward secrecy in 1994, when former Republican Gov. Pete Wilson's administration banned face-to-face interviews for fear of creating inmate celebrities.
Democratic Gov. Gray Davis recently vetoed a bill that would have eased those restrictions, in part because he said such interviews could bring renewed sorrow to victims' families.
Critics such as Peter Sussman, a former San Francisco Chronicle editor, respond that inmate interviews are particularly important during the current debate over whether innocent people are being sent to death row. Sussman wrote a 1993 book on the subject, Committing Journalism.
It also makes it more difficult for reporters to uncover abuses or wasteful spending, said society president Kyle Niederpruem, an assistant city editor at the Indianapolis Star. However, she said there has been little public outcry.