On the one hand, issuing a report that the sun rises in the east doesn’t seem worth the effort. On the other, it serves the purpose of reminding us that the problem is still there, and maybe deserves some room on the front burner. The report, issued by the Juvenile Law Center, is provocatively titled Debtors’ Prison For Kids, The High Cost of Fines and Fees in the Juvenile Justice System.
Across the country, youth and their families, including many in poverty, face monetary charges for a young person’s involvement in the juvenile justice system. Too often, the inability to pay pushes the young person deeper into the juvenile justice system and exacerbates the family’s economic distress. This report examines how and when youth and families face financial obligations, briefly looks at the economic consequences, and considers the legal consequences for failure to pay.
There is nothing in there that is unfamiliar to anyone representing the poor, in general, and poor kids, in particular. But these are the most easily forgotten, unless you happen to have the misfortune of being poor and involved in the legal system. In that case, it’s impossible to forget, as it follows you around forever.
Labor Day seems a particularly appropriate time to consider that people work to earn money, and are then compelled to spend some amount of that money for purposes other than their survival. Nobody likes to piss away money on taxes, even though we realize that taxes are the price of government services. Sometimes a particular service benefits us directly, so we don’t hate it as much as others, but nobody is good with the whole concept. One of the cool mechanisms politicians invented to shift the cost off the general taxpayer and onto the “user” was court costs.
It starts with the notion that everybody hates criminals, and everybody believes that anyone arrested did something to deserve it. So no one will cry sad tears that people prosecuted get dumped on. Courts and related services cost money, right? Why should good people pay for these costs when they could be charged back to the criminals? Taxpayers surely won’t mind not having to pay for the cost of putting away the bad guys. And it’s their own fault, since the criminals did the crime. If they didn’t want to pay, they shouldn’t commit crimes.
On the surface, it makes complete sense. And who is going to complain about it? It’s not like criminals or the poor have a lobbying group or political support.
This system is a disaster for the poor. For those who didn’t commit a crime, but were arrested anyway, it adds insult to injury. For those whose “crime” was something trivial, a speeding ticket, the burden of costs and surcharges takes what would be an annoyance to those who can afford to pay it and turns it into a choice of feeding the kids or paying the surcharge, as they’re living hand to mouth or worse.
The problem compounds when days spent in court are days of missed work, sometimes causing them to lose their job. Or when their driver’s license is suspended for non-payment, a brilliant idea for coercing payment but a really lousy idea if you want them to be able to drive to work to earn money to pay the court costs. Then it compounds again when they drive of necessity, get pinched for driving on a suspended license and get dumped on all over again.*
There are a million permutations of this problem, but most of us don’t think about it because it’s not our problem. But there’s more. When the dumpee isn’t an adult, but a child, the entire scheme takes a dive to depths few consider. And that’s why this report matters.
When these young people or their families fail to pay, they may end up behind bars, be forced to return to court over and over again, or have their driver’s licenses suspended, making it harder for them to go to school or work. Families that are already struggling to get by may have to decide between paying the courts or buying food and clothing.
Kids generally aren’t making a bundle, if anything. Where is a 12-year-old supposed to come up with cash to buy his way out of court? So the burden falls on his parents, because they don’t have enough problems and, after all, they must have failed as parents if the kid did something wrong, making us not feel too badly about the dump even though it’s nonsense reasoning.
In general, the report found, these burdens — many ostensibly aimed at deterring crime — have the opposite effect: By saddling young people with piles of debt they cannot pay, they increase the likelihood that juveniles will wind up in trouble with the law again. And like so much else about the criminal justice system, these costs fall most heavily on poor and nonwhite juveniles.
The question ultimately becomes what’s more important, more societally beneficial. Collecting some easy cash from people who can’t stop government from using them as easy ATMs, or preventing crime, stopping recidivism (if not creating criminals by taking away the option of surviving as a working citizen), giving poor kids the opportunity to grow into law-abiding adults or locking them into poverty and crime going forward.
But we’re still not done, because as it turns out, this whole scheme is a failure in execution. While the good taxpayers, who don’t want to hear about problems and get headaches from thinking, are cool with the idea of dumping costs on the poor to cover the costs of the legal system, it turns out that it doesn’t do squat.
A recent study in Alameda County, Calif., found that juveniles in its justice system were charged, on average, about $2,000, or two months’ salary for a single parent earning the federal minimum wage. Yet after the county paid the costs associated with collecting those fees, it netted almost no revenue.
Alameda County called a moratorium on juvenile probation fees after it figured out that this brilliant idea didn’t actually work. It doesn’t work for kids. It doesn’t work for adults. It was a lousy idea from the outset, even though it had superficial appeal to people who worked hard for their money and were only too happy to have criminals pay their own freight.
It’s Labor Day, 2016, when we show appreciation for the hard-working men and women that keep our country functioning. Enjoy your beer and barbecue. You can think about kids in jail, and adults in jail, for non-payment of costs tomorrow, when you pretend they deserve it and it’s good for you. Don’t even try to think too hard about it today, as it will spoil your enjoyment of the holiday. Nobody wants a headache on Labor Day.
*This description doesn’t even scratch the surface of the various costs, surcharges, etc., that arise from the system. The report explains at length the myriad fees, surcharges, fines, court costs, program costs, public defender fees, etc., that are imposed on defendants, guilty or not, rich or poor, deserving or undeserving.
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Years ago, when a new client told me the only time he had been to prison (as opposed to jail, where I met and interviewed him), it was for driving, I was shocked. It was true. I commonly represent poor people who would have to pay thousands in fines, fees and interest to get their driver’s license. The poor drive in poor neighborhoods, in POS cars, under the watchful eyes of the law, where they are stopped and ticketed far more frequently than those in middle class neighborhoods.
Even a $100 ticket presents a real problem. Pay the ticket or buy groceries? The simple act of adjusting ticket costs for income would be enormously helpful, but I’ve never even heard it mentioned by a lawmaker.
When I retire from my public defender job, I should pursue a career as a lobbiest for the poor.
How many “problems” wouldn’t be problems if judges exercised their authority without their vision blurred by their anal walls? I don’t know if it’s just too much work to think, assume their all lying criminals or that they really don’t like the poor, but the connections between poverty and punishment just don’t register. An easy fix, but it requires something the judiciary has been incapable of doing.
In fairness, any judge who demonstrates thought tends to ultimately be crucified by the public, media and politicians for the inevitable time when his omniscience fails him.
Let me sprinkle a little water on this here comment section retort of yours and give it a gentle autumn pruning and perhaps, even though it has a “bad parent” it will one day grow up to a become a legendary post thanks to foodstamps or the earned income credit or something or another. That is, if it can avoid geting arrested for doing skateboarding tricks off the white zone curb and losing its independent transportation privileges forever.
P.S. If CDL’s wore their patches more proudly them judges could no longer ignore who was doing the heavy lifting after all the teddy bears from those toys-for-tots-rides had been distributed and they might even start to think twice about strolling into the local tavern like they owned the place. Hell, they might even start realizing there is a reason why it’s a good idea to tip the bar tender.
So you advocate that because a person is not well off there should be no consequences for breaking the law?
Hardly.
So then, whats the answer. For traffic infractions the choice of punishments is limited. You get caught speeding or running a stop sign/ redlight, its either fine or Jail. So I impose a fine and the state surcharge, which by the way is worse than the fine in some instances.
Now the person doesn’t pay, whats the options? My only choice is just do nothing or suspend. Do nothing and the comptroller and OCA dings you, suspend and now the FEDS say I violated your rights.
Kind of a catch 22.
You’re a smart guy. Turn your question around and answer it. Should the punishment for a speeding ticket be loss of car, job, apartment, weeks or months in jail, because a person couldn’t afford to pay the state surcharge (which by the way is worse than the fine in some instances)? If not, then what?
Forget the comptroller. You are the judge. In a sentencing situation, your sole concern is imposing a sentence that is punitive but no more so than necessary. Don’t let someone with an unhealthy obsession with enumerating legumes dictate how you do that.
For some reason no Reply button was there to reply to you, I am telling you this so I won’t get a famous SHG ding.
No, the punishment for a speeding ticket should not be the loss of a car. A vast amount of the problem is the person that has to pay the fine just ignores it. I always to tell people that we take payments and if they have a problem paying to call the court and we can work out a schedule. I have had some pay as little as $10 a month faithfully until its all paid.
But a vast majority, just do nothing, you get the oh, I forgot.
As to doing nothing, ask the SCJC what they think about judges not doing enough to collect fine. They take a dim view of it and more than one judge has been called on the carpet and took a sucking chest wound for that.
You’re avoiding the question. Poor person. Surcharge. Are they all liars, drinking margaritas on their yachts refusing to pay the surcharge? And that’s nice that you offer a $10 a month payout (even if that means they’re paying for the rest of their natural life), but let’s not make this about you (because the people who comment here are always the good guys and never do anything bad) and deal with the issue at hand. Even if they fail to pay the $120 speeding ticket and the $270 surcharge, a month in jail (with all the ensuing problems) is the answer? So they’re an irresponsible speeder. Lock ’em up, so they lose their job? Because this somehow makes money?
(Comments only nest 5 deep, so the just use the last reply button, as you did.)
So lets take your speeder
The state says minimum fine in NY between 10-30 MPH over the limit is $90 plus the $93 surcharge. You must impose that as a minimum. The normal is 30 days to pay unless you ask for more time.
There is no option under the law except to sentence them to jail, which isn’t going to happen. So if they don’t communicate to me that there is an issue paying and just don’t pay, the only solution is to suspend their license.
I can’t reduce the fine, not allowed. I can’t forgive the fine, not allowed. If I don’t hear from them, then what?
A lot of people complain when their license gets suspended, but 99% of the time its because they just ignored the ticket.
Maybe there is a better answer, but in the statutory scheme in NY there is not an alternative that I am aware of.
You’re not trying here. Let’s assume you you chose not to reduce the infraction from speeding to an equipment violation, which you can do, because the deft is the worst speeder ever in the history of speeding. You note the fine is $90, but more than doubled by surcharges. The evil speeder doesn’t pay, because not everybody behave like a prosecutor when fined for a world of reasons, which cops, prosecutors and judges presume to be because they’re just bad people, not poor, embarrassed, maybe irresponsible, maybe scared, maybe threatened. You say “99% of the time they just ignored the ticket.” Bullshit. You have no clue why and pull crap like that out of your ass because they’re not human, just skels who owe money. So you assume their failure is their choice and it makes you feel like less of a dick.
So we’ve already got a penalty that is a huge sum to them, but when their license gets suspended (and they’re still driving to their groovy job at the counter at McDonalds) and they get pinched, not the $183 fine multiplies, so they couldn’t make the fine and surcharge (which you still haven’t addressed) before, so make it double, suspend their license, cost them their job, etc., and your answer is screw ’em, that’s the law? That’s the problem. And it’s not just NY. And it’s not just your facile fall-back (the law…). And this doesn’t take into account the new sentence for driving on a suspended license, the additional costs and interest imposed by many jurisdictions for non-payment until the amount reach into the thousand (which is kind of a problem for someone earning $17k a year with three kids), and you know nothing about this because you assume they’re just bad people who are telling you and the court to kiss their ass.
The law does not require people be jailed for non-payment of money they don’t have, even if the prosecutor is a little dick who assumes 99% of defts just ignored the fine because he can’t be bothered and it makes him feel better to pretend all the people harmed deserve it.
Looking at the numbers, the Alameda Country moratorium sounds like it was more a human resources/cost-benefit rather than social policy decision.
It does, which is a good thing. When it comes to money, bad social policy is less consequential than bad financial policy.
God bless capitalism.