fines are only a punishment for the poor

The Illinois report recommends the following five core principles: Courts should be funded from general government revenue, not user taxes. And about the kind of amounts they're imposing? . From traffic citations, juvenile, misdemeanor and felony convictions, people are charged fines, fees and payment costs related to a violation of the law, and additional costs for court processing. (Washington, DC, June 21, 2018) The United States government at all levels should act to prevent the criminal justice system from punishing poverty and further impoverishing the poor, the Criminal Justice Policy Program (CJPP) at Harvard Law School and Human Rights Watch said today. In many other countries around the world, they find systems, and under those systems, their offense has a score, a number associated with the offense that they're convicted of. But I can't pay these fines and fees and interest. Today, dueling is deemed unconscionable. Ukraine remains in control of a key supply route into the eastern city of Bakhmut, a military spokesperson has said. I may be required to impose it. The Washington legislature has passed two pieces of legislation with provisional restoration of voting rights (House Bill 1517) and more interest relief options (Senate Bill 5423). It is hard for us now to understand how the Framers of our Constitution could embrace such a misguided and barbaric practice. If a court were to find that their effect is significantly harsher than the longstanding punishment practices they have replaced, it could appropriately find them cruel and unusual. In particular, authorities should not rely on fines and fees to pay for government programs because they disproportionately hurt the poor. It just makes no sense intuitively whatsoever in terms of generating money for local jurisdictions, and in terms of creating public safety, and in terms of supporting individuals who have done a wrong to society, have paid their sentence, in terms of spending time in jails and prisons, and having that conviction on their record, not allowing them to move forward in their lives to be successful citizens. Lifelong ties to the system. It's time to renew your membership and keep access to free CLE, valuable publications and more. In other counties, anyone who owed any debt would regularly have warrants put out for their arrest, and they'd be incarcerated for up to 60 days.WATKINS:So it's not uncommon, then, for people to end up in jail for being unable to meet their debts, in this case, a debt to the court system?HARRIS:No, it's not uncommon at all. Is there consistency, at least, in the systemacross states, say, in how the system is applied?HARRIS:In Washington, I found this huge variation in the five counties that I studied, and the ways in which judges interpreted the state statute, applied it, and then monitored individuals. Could you just briefly explain what each of them are, and then the way they work together to often create this kind of ballooning, I think you call it, a permanent fiscal sentence?HARRIS:Right. Provide advice to individuals about LFOs, as Columbia Legal Services has done. Though Texas law provides only for fines for such offenses, it requires that persons unabe to pay must be incarcerated for sufficient time to satisfy their fines, at the rate of $5 per day, which in petitioner's case meant an 85-day term. And they sort of recognized that the population that they were managing had a really difficult time with the debt that was going to be imposed on them. What exactly am I assessing for? Even if determined indigent, the defendant may have to pay a fee for counsel or reimburse counsel expenses later. These are fees on top of the base charges, and they range from 0 to 83 percent. The state courts denied his petition for habeas corpus. American Bar Association Restitution (50 states and the District of Columbia). All fines should be replaced with community service or a system that gauges fine amounts based on net income. And we also found that there was the use of unlawful bail practices resulting in unnecessary and unconstitutional incarceration.. Allen gave examples of Columbia Legal Services clients to explain how LFOs truly work against people who are unable to pay from the very start. But in California, eliminating juvenile fines and fees is an amazing step forward in recognizing that people who can't work can't pay back this debt. To supplement the 50-state statutory review and get a sense of what was really happening on the ground, JLC surveyed 180 individuals in 41 states. In researching the penalties imposed on young people for not paying LFOs, JLC is discovering that they include civil contempt, criminal contempt, incarceration, further fines, license suspension, violations of probation, violations of informal adjustment, civil judgment, and misdemeanors. Since the modern era of capital punishment in the United States began in the 1970s, 154 people have been proven innocent after being sentenced to death. If youve ever had an encounter with the criminal justice system, chances are it came with a price tag. was really concerned about how his mom perceived him because of his own shame. Six children were among the dead after a Russian missile attack on Uman; Russian soldiers are likely being placed in improvised cells consisting of holes in the ground as punishment, the UK's MoD . So there's several layers of punishment, and in addition to that, they have a felony conviction with a host of collateral consequences. LFOs lead to financial constraint especially because of cost increases with interest. Various states charge for use of a public defender, a DNA sample, a drug test, a diversion program, your monthly parole meetings, even a jury trial. Phrased differently, there is nothing in the Constitution that gives unelected judges the authority to overturn laws enacted by democratically elected legislatures, based on the judges own subjective ideas of what current standards of decency require. Share this via Printer. Maybe $2,000 for your first drug offense conviction, and then it might raise on subsequent convictions. Answer (1 of 5): It depends : Does the offense and conviction carry other slightly less tangible impacts, such as a police/criminal record that must be disclosed or negative points on a license for example. Burr ran for governor of New York and Hamilton widely considered the most influential founding father of the United States opposed his candidacy, making public remarks that Burr found insulting. At the webinar, Nick Allen delved into this last bucket of restitution LFOs and the issues they present. And so other judges, and prosecutors, and clerks, felt that this was a system of accountabilitythis is another way, from a paternalistic standpoint, that individuals can be held accountable and show that they're remorseful for their crime. I need to make sure that I get paid. Examples are drug and alcohol, general, mental health, and DNAa wide variety. So in general, I refer to these as monetary sanctions, or legal financial obligations. LFOs bring more emotional strain and delegitimizing of the justice system. An error occurred while subscribing your email address. It is common for courts to find a violation because the defendant couldnt pay costs. If they're determined to be indigent, and I select that category on the calculator, it will automatically lock out cost. Harris is gratified by the surge in attention the issue has been receiving, but worries not enough peoplewhether among legal professionals or the general publicappreciate the "layers of punishment" low-income defendants are being subjected to. It just slowly becomes a permanent punishment for people who are poor in our society.WATKINS:Yeah, I've seen, I think, the family of a young man who was assessed with all kinds of fines and fees describe it as, "Feeling like you're drowning in a swimming pool, and they just keep adding more water over top of your head. Lumped together are a large number of costs: for example, paying for the cost of incarceration, GPS, and monitoring. Black people were a political minority, and policies that denied their basic rights were extremely popular. If anything all fines should be based on a portion of income. A much talked about best practice is the concept of day fines, which is like a sentencing grid, so the amount of the LFO is proportionate to the offense and what the defendant is able to pay. Rather than providing support to the poor, U.S. social policies appear designed to punish and . For the sake of simplicity, in this article, we will use the term LFO whenever possible to refer to such fines, fees, and costs. Your membership has expired - last chance for uninterrupted access to free CLE and other benefits. Im Matt Watkins. Former federal public defender Alexandra Natapoff says 13 million misdemeanors are filed each year in the U.S., trapping the innocent, punishing the poor and making society more unequal. Twenty-five percent of his income is taken out, so he cant cover basic living expenses. For example, Abraham Holmes argued that Congress might repeat the abuses of that diabolical institution, the Inquisition, and start imposing torture on those convicted of federal crimes: They are nowhere restrained from inventing the most cruel and unheard-of punishments, and annexing them to crimes; and there is no constitutional check on them, but that racks and gibbets may be amongst the most mild instruments of their discipline. Patrick Henry asserted, even more pointedly than Holmes, that the lack of a prohibition of cruel and unusual punishments meant that Congress could use punishment as a tool of oppression: Congress . Now that you have this deeper appreciation, just how big of a role do you see fines and fees playing in the justice system as a whole?COBURN:I think it plays a huge role. Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. Due to your consent preferences, you're not able to view this. We do know some things about the history of the phrase cruel and unusual punishments. In 1689 a full century before the ratification of the United States Constitution England adopted a Bill of Rights that prohibited cruell and unusuall punishments. In 1776, George Mason included a prohibition of cruel and unusual punishments in the Declaration of Rights he drafted for the Commonwealth of Virginia. In Arizona, 10 percent of an 83 percent surcharge goes to a clean elections fund even though people with felony convictions paying this surcharge cannot vote; in Delaware, a 50 percent surcharge on fines goes to a transportation fund. This understanding of the original meaning of the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause leads to very different results than either the non-originalist approach or Justices Scalias and Thomass approach. One man who owed the city close to $1,000 in fines wrote to the city that he wanted to pay what he owed and was trying to put together what he could, but it was hard to get work with the warrants. WATKINS:Yeah, from that perspective, it also seems hopeful that the issue of fines and fees appears to be getting a lot more attention of latein media coverage, and public discourse, and I think from criminal justice reformers as well. Accordingly, progressives believe the Court must protect the disfavored, the unpopular, the minority groups who can expect no protection from officials elected by majority vote. These practices appear to have evolved from governments desire to reduce taxation to support criminal justice in favor of increasing fines and fees for offenders. Legally, they can't work, children, up to certain ages, so it does not make sense to impose a debt on them. You, though, I understand have come up with an innovative solution potentially to this problem. Monetary sanctions reduce family income and create long-term debt. In 2013, in a city of about 21,000 people, the court issued more than 9,000 municipal arrest warrants relating to cases of minor violations, traffic tickets, and housing code violations. Nick Allen presented the negative consequences that stem from the imposition of LFOs in Washington and nationally. Subscribe to New Thinking on Apple Podcasts, Neighbors in Action: Creating Safer and Healthier Communities, Sixth Amendment Initiative: Strengthening the Constitutional Protections of the Accused, Misdemeanors Matter #2: Alexandra Natapoff on a Legacy of Injustice (, Court Costs Entrap Nonwhite, Poor Juvenile Offenders (. So, there is a legal protection, but the problem is that our courts at the state level have not established how judges should be interpreting the criteria by which judges should be interpreting willful nonpayment. There are many different terms used interchangeably across the countrysuch as monetary sanctions, legal financial obligations (LFOs), and assessments (e.g., in Illinois)to describe the different fines, fees, and costs associated with offenses and the courts. They might have to attend victim's classes, they might have electronic home monitoring. Many courts are struggling to interpret a 1983 Supreme Court ruling protecting defendants from going to jail because they are too poor to pay their fines. These tools often lack transparency and are subject to political manipulation, which raises serious due process concerns, he says. E.B. Keywords: litigation, childrens rights, legal financial obligations, court fines, restitution, interest, juvenile court. In some cases, there's mandatory LFOs that we must impose, and we look at this person, we look at their history, and do we think that that's going to be able to be paid? by John F. Stinneford. A cumulated disadvantage is generatedaccessing food, housing, employment, and medication, and avoidance of police and other institutions. There needs to be a nexus between an assessment and its rationale. On the third LFO, he owes $3,500 in principal and $3,300 in interest. He cites bail bond corporations, which charge high fees and interest, and private supervision and collection companies, which charge additional fees and often rely on arrest warrants to secure payment. This is what our taxpayer money actually should go towards in the criminal justice system, but fees are for people who go through the court. And people wonder why we don't have debtor's prisons. And that's another conversation we need to start having. And then people can be sentenced up to 60 days; one jurisdiction had a $300 pay-or-stay. Bains noted that the court routinely imposed excessive fines and ordered the arrest of low-income residents for failure to appear or to make payments, sometimes despite inadequate notice and also without inquiring into their ability to pay. So when I was doing my research, I saw judges ask about women's manicures. In recent years, some judges and scholars have argued that the meaning of the Constitution should change as societal values change. I was one of those suicidal kids you read about. So, if there are three cases, the victim in the third case will not receive restitution until the first two cases are paid off. And that is the amount of money that is supposed to be directly paid towards my victim. Though Texas law provides only for fines for such offenses, it requires that persons unable to pay must be incarcerated for sufficient time to satisfy their fines, at the rate of $5 per day, which, in petitioner's case, meant an 85-day term. We do not have dedicated funding for our court systems. Recent Washington legislative efforts include highlighting the disproportionate effects on the poor and communities of color, reducing the 12 percent interest rate, defining terms (criteria for indigence, ability to pay, types of evidence defendants can provide, willful nonpayment), establishing clear alternatives, making LFOs discretionary, and establishing statewide consistency. Get updates on human rights issues from around the globe. And so even though you had clients who want to please the court and say, "I can make payments of $50 a month or $25 a month," you don't necessarily really understand in their circumstances what they're giving up in order to do that, or how long it's going to take them to actually pay off the LFOs and what implications that that may mean.WATKINS: What would you say then that you are understanding now better, and how did you come to that understanding? Receive important updates about our work transforming the justice system. And when you cant pay, you could end up in jail. Thanks for listening. And we're not yet erasing the lines, and that's what I think we need to do. Best practices and ideas on how to change our restitution system are emerging from across the country, and they include taking into account the persons ability to pay, allowing for conversion of restitution to community service, looking to more restorative justice approaches, imposing restitution rather than other fines, imposing statutes of limitations on restitution, allowing for modification of restitution, and making it a civil collection and taking it out of the criminal and juvenile justice systems. They are funded by the local jurisdictions. Share this via Facebook The United Nations special rapporteur on extreme poverty, Philip Alston, highlighted the practice during a recent visit to the country. There are no options for relief from restitution. WATKINS:You've talked about how when you were a public defender and perhaps when you started out as a judge, you didn't have a full appreciation of the impact of fines and fees. Burr was never prosecuted for the murder of Hamilton. And they may think that's it and don't necessarily recognize that it's going to balloon. Edmonds Municipal Court Judge Linda Coburn in Washington State believes the system of "legal financial obligations" has grown so complex, judges and attorneys often fail to appreciate the burden they represent. . This show is edited and produced by me, you can find me on Twitter @didacticmatt, if you have any feedback to share. Surcharges for court and non-court-related costs. How do we measure a punishments cruelty? So there's a direct relationship to how this debt can impact negatively people's ability to access employment. First, the task force identified the types of civil and criminal court assessments present in Illinois circuit courts, from filing to mandatory arbitration fees. Restitution is almost impossible to undo and will never expire. Third, does the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause prohibit the death penalty? Please try again. I started by asking her how much she realized then about the impact of LFOs on her clients, especially because, as she explained, most of them were too poor to pay just about any fine a court might set.Judge Linda COBURN:I would always make an argument for the courts to not impose any mandatory fines and fees. Whereas now, I break down what that represents, and I understand what that means. Assessments should be simple, easy to understand, and uniform. What does it mean for a punishment to be cruel and unusual? And many of the people that I've interviewed have said this: "I know I need to be held accountable. State and local governments, with support from the federal government, should respond to the special rapporteurs findings by working together to remedy the two-tiered system of justice, CJPP and Human Rights Watch said. After Hamiltons death, many religious leaders began arguing for the abolition of dueling the way some people now seek the abolition of the death penalty. She is a professor of sociology at the University of Washington and the author of the 2016 book from the Russell Sage foundation: A Pound of Flesh: Monetary Sanctions as Punishment for the Poor. I believe that the question whether the death penalty violates the Eighth Amendment cannot be resolved by simply asking whether a person deserves to die for the crime he has committed. For many, this means it is critical to reject efforts to limit constitutional protections to the original intentions of the flawed men who wrote the Constitution. And both of those are supposed to be punitive, related to your punishment. Deductions ordered by the court or the Department of Corrections. So what's supposed to happen if someone has this debt, they're not making payments, the court should summon them to court. (3) Does the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause prohibit the death penalty? There is not time or space here to answer all these questions, but the essays that follow will demonstrate differing ways of approaching several of them. According to Feierman, the JLC found that the problem is widespread and highly problematic. The report outlines the types of costs imposed: Court costs (27 states). Jessica Feierman explained how the Juvenile Law Center kept hearing stories from its clients about all the different costs, fines, and fees involved, so the center took the time to do a 50-state statutory review to get a sense of the problem nationally and to look at what can be done. Here are suggestions of what you can do to make a difference on these issues: Watch the Criminalizing Poverty webinar, available at no cost, and reach out to the speakers. One of the clients had LFOs from three different convictions in the early 2000s. That's an example where she didn't intend that. Government . Then there are the fees collected at almost every step of the process. It was really nice to talk with you.WATKINS:That was Alexes Harris. Recent Findings and Emerging Best Practices: Illinois; Ferguson, Missouri; Washington A famous piece of literature? Dr. Harris has also found other courts nationally that are more restorative and allow people to pay off their debt by attending programs that lead to better reintegration into their community. And just like all proper income taxes, based on an INCREASING percentage of income. I challenge you to find any municipal or county clerk that can detail this out for you, because I don't think the local jurisdictions know what's happening.WATKINS:I mean, it stands to reason that if you're trying to collect money from a lot of people who don't have very much to begin with, you're probably going to spend a fair bit going after them and not get much in return, no?HARRIS:Right, and I don't have the numbers right in front of me, but the average payment amounts are very little: under $30 per open account annually, in many jurisdictions in the state of Washington. Share this via Email What I shouldn't consider is, "Well, I need to make sure that my clerk gets paid. Conduct more research or coordinate with someone who can conduct more research. In the state of Washington, we are one of the, if not the, lowest, funded court system in the country. It depends : Is the fine based on ability to pay. So even one policy maker I interviewed said that, "The system allows for people to every month make a payment and then express their remorse." And fines are associated with a particular type of offense. Can you waive it? Cost of counsel. Second, does the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause only prohibit barbaric methods of punishment, or does it also prohibit punishments that are disproportionate to the offense? For wealthy people, they can express it and pay it, right? Permanent punishment for the poor is what I call it. That shouldn't be the case, right? I would say yes, I think I have been less inclined to, previously where I think I imposed $200 inclusive, and then let the clerks break down what that represents. Fall behind on your payments, and you're liable to be hit with interest and more fees. Progressive perspectives on the Eighth Amendment insist that evolving standards of decency must shape and inform the Supreme Courts application of the Eighth Amendment. This is a purposeful consequence that our policy makers have created for individuals who make contact with our systems of justice, and it's completely counter to everything that we know, as sociologists, as criminologists, about what people need to do, or the types of supports and circumstances that people need to have post-incarceration and conviction in order to be successful and move forward with their lives.WATKINS:And how much has the practice of fines and fees, how much has it grown in recent decades?HARRIS:My argument in my book is that as the result of mass conviction and incarceration, we've seen states in the 90s and the early 2000s dramatically expand the types of fines and fees that can be imposed, and the amounts of fines and fees that can be imposed. In some instances, what would happen if somebody said, "Well, I'm on food stamps now," and courts would say, "All right, but you could get a job tomorrow, so therefore I'm not finding you indigent." We have executed more than 1400 people during the same time period. I didnt want her to see her son being in the situation he was in. Now, the misdemeanor and the traffic tickets are a different issue, because many times, those people aren't going to jail or prison and have these other punishment options. After looking up the fine, JLC discovered that it could be up to $500, and it was discretionary. Do you want to talk a little bit about this calculator that you've helped create?COBURN:The whole purpose of this calculator is to make it available to judges, defense attorneys, prosecutors, advocates, whoever that may be. I literally was in a hearing and saw a judge ask a woman about her tattoos. Your vagina shortens and narrows with age. Neither the Constitutions Framers nor the document they created was flawless. What started off as $3,400 in principal that he already lacked the ability to pay has now ballooned over $12,000 in LFOs, and there is really no end in sight because of the interest and because they are not going to expire, Allen points out. Caitlin Croley, Punishment Only for the Poor: The Unconstitutionality of Pay-to-Vote Disenfranchisement Laws, 71 Emory L. J. During the program, the panelists highlighted the new findings from Illinois, Ferguson, and Washington to give specific examples of LFOs and their effects. So, there is this inherent creation of the money that is being collected through the courts as being viewed as revenue, and so that creates this difficult dynamic and pressure, whether it's sometimes explicit from the legislative branch of the government or whether it's implicit. Yeah, so that runs counter to all of our notions - a lot of this runs counter to our notions of justice!WATKINS:Paying for a public defender, for example.HARRIS:Exactly. Research shows clearly that the chance of being caught is a vastly more effective deterrent than even draconian punishment.

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