diff --git a/src/Core/ACL.php b/src/Core/ACL.php
index f7b892405..aa5e2221b 100644
--- a/src/Core/ACL.php
+++ b/src/Core/ACL.php
@@ -66,8 +66,9 @@ class ACL
 
 		$tpl = Renderer::getMarkupTemplate('acl/message_recipient.tpl');
 		$o = Renderer::replaceMacros($tpl, [
-			'$contacts' => json_encode($contacts),
-			'$selected' => $selected,
+			'$contacts'      => $contacts,
+			'$contacts_json' => json_encode($contacts),
+			'$selected'      => $selected,
 		]);
 
 		Hook::callAll(DI::args()->getModuleName() . '_post_recipient', $o);
diff --git a/view/templates/acl/message_recipient.tpl b/view/templates/acl/message_recipient.tpl
index b8aabf8c7..701ba23a6 100644
--- a/view/templates/acl/message_recipient.tpl
+++ b/view/templates/acl/message_recipient.tpl
@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@
 		let $recipient_input = $('[name="recipient"]');
 
 		let acl = new Bloodhound({
-			local: {{$contacts nofilter}},
+			local: {{$contacts_json nofilter}},
 			identify: function(obj) { return obj.id.toString(); },
 			datumTokenizer: Bloodhound.tokenizers.obj.whitespace(['name', 'addr']),
 			queryTokenizer: Bloodhound.tokenizers.whitespace,