Page 53 - Impact: Collected Essays on the Threat of Economic Inequality

costs must be weighed in light of the offender’s employment prospects and restrictions that bar felons from other rights and privileges . For these individuals, the harm is “excessive,” but this aspect is subsumed by objective, one-size-fits-all fining schemes; fines, interest, capitalization, and cross-collateralization, are only punitively sensible with respect to a person’s financial worth and prospects for paying . As what is manageable for one could be financial death for another, failure to consider the defendant’s position can sanction punishment so severe that it destroys hope for a livelihood . In this ongoing economic slaughter, all branches of government wear stains, including a judiciary that is reluctant to make “excessive fines” meaningful as a mode of redress .
The inability to enforce this provision is engulfing communities in poverty and class bias . As scholars have argued, the imposition of monetary sanctions is “incompatible with policy efforts to enhance reintegration, lacks a convincing penological rationale, and raises numerous concerns about justice and fairness .”41 For those struggling to set their lives straight after release, it spells ruin . This has been the understanding of at least one state that decided against additional inmate fees, finding that the burden would lead “to a host of negative and unintended consequences .”42
If monetary sanctions are to be effective, they must be structured in a way that makes sense, such that offenders can actually pay .43 Toward this end, it has been recommended that “consistent guidelines regarding determination of indigence and policies for assessing and collecting LFOs should be implemented in every jurisdiction to guard against arbitrary or racially skewed discrepancies in punishment .”44 LFOs may be most effective when instituted under principles of day fine systems . Such fining systems typically impose fines with respect to the offender’s actual financial situation and often in lieu of incarceration.45 Under such a scheme, the individual has a means of finding a job and can begin immediately paying the fine, while taxpayers are spared the burden of processing, housing, and maintaining another inmate .
Today’s courts, however, impose harsh financial penalties in addition to imprisonment . Present policies force offenders to spend their time idly, watching their debt grow into a master that will enslave long after the body is free . The state’s failure to equip offenders with education or vocational training as a strategy to pay the penalties reveals a breakdown in the system . •
41 See Beckett & Harris, supra note 10, at 509-10.
42 massachuseTTs execuTive office of puBlic safeTy and securiTy, reporT of The special commission To sTudy The feasiBiliTy of esTaBlishing inmaTe fees, inmaTe fees as a source of revenue review of challenges 4 (July 1, 2011), available at http:// www.prisonpolicy.org/scans/inmate_fee_final_7-1-11.pdf.
43 See, e.g., roopal paTel & meghna philip, Brennan cTr. for JusTice, criminal JusTice deBT: a Tool kiT for acTion 33-36 (2012), available at https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/legacy/publications/Criminal%20Justice%20 Debt%20Background%20for%20web.pdf (offering recommendations for better penalty structures).
44 See am. civil liBerTies union, supra note 28, at 11.
45 See generally, edwin w. zedlewski, naTional insTiTuTe of JusTice, alTernaTives To cusTodial supervision: The day fine
(May 2010), available at http://csgjusticecenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/2010-day-fines.pdf.
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