Page 50 - Impact: Collected Essays on the Threat of Economic Inequality

48
including departments of corrections and private prison companies, are authorized to charge inmates for the cost of their imprisonment, supervision, and court-mandated tests .18 Other agencies may charge collection fees as well as interest on delinquent accounts . The net effect of these burdens is concentration of financial failure in the most depressed segments of society .
Drawing Blood from Stones: Impoverishing the Poor
Understanding monetary sanctions is critical to understanding how the justice system creates inequality . The existing research paints an ominous picture for convicts and their communities due to the harsh effects of incarceration and financial penalties . As most felony convicts are indigent prior to incarceration, LFOs aim for pockets that are already empty .
Imposing monetary sanctions on offenders is a little studied, yet powerful, means of reproducing inequality .19 The amounts can be significant in respect to the average annual earnings for ex- prisoners, with a substantial majority—80 to 90 percent—of individuals charged with crimes eligible for free court-appointed counsel . This means that sanctions are relatively large in respect to expected earnings .20 Black males have borne, and continue to bear, the brunt of mass imprisonment, comprising 37 percent of all prisoners in 2013, the largest portion of male inmates under state or federal jurisdiction .21
The combination of indigence and debt leads to an array of economic setbacks . Prominent among these are unemployment, depressed credit ratings, heightened housing instability, and homelessness . Many cannot open traditional bank accounts and may be compelled to borrow on less favorable terms, paying more for loans, services, and goods .22
In some states the LFO penalty scheme is harsh . In Washington, for example, “sentencing courts may impose many LFOs without determining whether offenders are able to pay .”23 The sanction begins accruing interest from the date of conviction at 12 percent until the LFOs and interest are paid in full .24 Courts cannot defer interest during incarceration,25 and neither LFOs nor interest can be discharged in bankruptcy .26 Once released, offenders may then apply for a waiver or reduction of the interest they have accrued on LFOs .27 Moreover, under some circumstances, offenders may be jailed for failing to pay their LFOs .28 The repayment period can be lengthy, as one commentator has calculated:
18 See Harris et al., supra note 2, at 1759.
19 Id. at 1755.
20 See Beckett & Harris, supra note 10, at 516.
21 See carson, supra note 8, at 1.
22 See Harris et al., supra note 2, at 1763.
23 Michael L. Vander Giessen, Legislative Reforms for Washington State’s Criminal Monetary Penalties, 47 gonz. l. rev. 547, 550 (2012).
24 wash. rev. code § 10.82.090 (amended 2015).
25 State v. Claypool, 45 P.3d 609, 610 (Wash. Ct. App. 2002) (construing wash. rev. code § 10.82.090 (amended 2015)).
26 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(7)(Supp. IV 2010); See also Kelly v. Robinson, 479 U.S. 36, 50 (1986); See also State v. Cunningham, 69 P.3d 358, 358 (Wash. Ct. App. 2003).
27 wash. rev. code § 10.82.090(2) (amended 2015).
28 am. civil liBerTies union, in for a penny: The rise of america’s new deBTors’ prisons 81 (2010), available at http://
csgjusticecenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/2010-ACLU-report.pdf.
Impact: Collected Essays on the Threat of Economic Inequality