Debtor's Prisons in 21st Century America

Women at mealtime - St. Pancras Workhouse in London

Last week Alan Pyke wrote an article posted on ThinkProgress.org about a recent court settlement reached with the city of Colorado Springs, Colorado in the wake of an ACLU suit filed over the incarceration of mostly poor and homeless individuals basically for being poor.

It's a sad testament to a 21st century America where the gap between the wealthiest and the poorest is as wide as it's ever been, and stagnant wages and crippling financial debt are a reality for millions of people.


Society has wrestled with the criminalization of poverty as a legal and moral issue since as far back as the middle ages when Europeans unable to pay off debts were taken to debtor's prisons where they could be kept for years until their debts were paid off.

Grim images of work houses (where people were locked up until they paid off debts through menial labor) in Ireland or England evoke scenes out of the books of English author Charles Dickens, who fictionalized settings, characters and scenes based on the social conditions he personally witnessed in England and France in the 1800's.

Marshalsea Debtor's Prison 1897

Dickens' views on the horrendous living conditions of the poor in the 19th century were deeply personal.

After his father John Dickens, who worked as a clerk in the Navy pay office, began to live beyond his means and accrue debts, he was imprisoned in the Marshalsea debtor's prison in London in 1824.

Dickens, who was well-read as a young boy and had attended private schools, was forced to leave school, take up residence with an impoverished friend of the family named Elizabeth Roylance, and work grueling ten hour shifts in a dilapidated rat-infested warehouse where he pasted labels onto pots of bootblack for six shillings a week.

Meager wages which went towards his room and board.


In fact, as Dickens would relate in The Life and Times of Charles Dickens, on his first day of work, a boy named Bob Fagin showed Dickens the proper way to attach the labels to the pots; Dickens later based the character Fagin from Oliver Twist off this same boy.

The remarkable yet disturbing book and PBS film Slavery By Another Name by Douglas A. Blackmon shed light on the systematic incarceration and forced servitude of thousands and thousands of African-Americans at the hands of a corrupt and racist judicial system in the southern United States after the Civil War up until World War II.

To look back on the deplorable social conditions of the poor and working class in Europe and America from the Middle Ages up through the 20th century, it's almost unimaginable to think that modern municipal governments in the wealthiest democracy in the Western world still imprison people for being poor - but as the ACLU suit against Colorado Springs shows - it's true.

And not just in Colorado either.

Ferguson cop Darren Wilson & Mary Ann Twitty (r)

In the wake of the killing of teenager Michael Brown by former Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson, the subsequent investigation of Ferguson's municipal courts and police department by the Department of Justice found a corrupt system that was systematically targeting middle and low income African-Americans for low-level administrative violations like parking violations, moving violations and even citations for "manner of walking" as a means to generate revenue.


Remember my blog about Mary Ann Twitty's magic wand? 

Remarkable that it took global outrage over a Ferguson PD officer shooting an unarmed 17 year-old boy in broad daylight and months of subsequent protests for the federal government to unravel the tentacles of a corrupt municipal court system working in tandem with the police department to intentionally target poor people of color simply to assign fines used as a revenue stream.

Modern debtor's prisons in America have even proven deadly.

Rex Iverson died over $2,376.92

Remember the story of Rex Iverson?

He was the Utah man who was jailed for failing to appear in court over an outstanding $2,376.92 bill that he owed for an ambulance ride in 2015.

After failing to respond to notices to pay the balance, he was arrested and placed in a holding cell where he was later found dead.


The inability to pay a fine also led to the death of 55 year-old Eileen DeNino back in June of 2014.

As Alan Pyke reported in an article for ThinkProgress.org two years ago, DeNino, a mother of seven, was jailed after not being able to provide documentation that she was not able to come up with $2,000 she owed from accrued fees related to her children being truant from the Reading, Pennsylvania school system.

Can someone explain the logic of locking a mother up in jail because she can't provide proof that she can't come up with $2,000?

55 year-old Eileen DeNino died over $2,000

Like Rex Iverson, she was arrested and a judge sentenced her to be incarcerated for 48 hours.

And like Iverson, DeNino was later found dead in the Berks County Jail.  

Over $2,000 in inflated fees and court costs.

The rise of for-profit prisons in the U.S. has also contributed to an increase in people being jailed because they can't pay court costs or fines.



A tactic that plays right into the hands of private companies like Judicial Correction Services (JSC) who routinely violate the constitutional rights of Americans and incarcerate them in private facilities - for profit.

It leads to some truly sad tales.

Stories like Georgia teenager Kevin Thompson a tow truck driver employed at an auto repair shop who was jailed for being unable to pay an $810 fine (based on a JSC recommendation...) after the DeKalb County Recorder's Court handed Thompson's case over to JSC.

Cases like these are all too common even though debtor's prisons were outlawed in the U.S. in the 1830's.

But as the old adage goes, what's old is made new again.

The glimmer of hope is that organizations like the ACLU, the Southern Poverty Law Center and other legal advocacy groups are continuing to focus attention and resources on egregious laws that allow local governments to jail people simply for not having enough money to pay fines.

Fines which are too often leveled at those already burdened by the economic disadvantages of existing at the lower end of the rungs of an unequal and all too frequently unjust society governed by politicians who still fancy it "the land of the free".

Rex Iverson and Eilleen DeNino would say that's a myth; and Charles Dickens would simply weep.

Courts Giveth & Courts Taketh Away - Legal Reforms in Ferguson & 'Unstructured Settlements' For Lead Poisoning Victims in Baltmore

Ferguson Judge Donald McCullin

The recent changes to the way in which the much-derided municipal courts in Ferguson, Missouri fundamentally operate illustrate that while the wheels of the dysfunctional American justice system may be slow to turn, they can indeed rotate in response to the demands of citizens, politicians, activists, clergy and the legal professionals who advocate on behalf of the disadvantaged.     
 
The internal gears of Ferguson's court systems are slowly beginning to grind against ingrained injustice, but it's a positive sign that they no longer grind exclusively against the poor and citizens of color.

It's not a magical cure-all, but perhaps it will lend some measure of meaning to the senseless death of unarmed American teenager Michael Brown at the hands of former Ferguson PD officer Darren Wilson.

On Monday recently-appointed 74-year old Ferguson municipal Judge Donald McCullin (pictured above) ordered sweeping changes to overhaul a court system that was essentially functioning as a revenue machine fueled disproportionately by the targeted persecution of working class and poor black citizens for a laundry list of minor legal infractions unfairly enforced by the Ferguson Police Department.  

McCullin ordered all warrants issued prior to December 2014 to be voided, and also radically altered sentencing for minor infractions like traffic violations with carefully structured payment plans based on defendant's income, or community service options in lieu of fees.

The legal changes, including revoking arrest warrants for 'failure to appear' charges based on minor infractions, represent significant and concrete legal reforms that could serve as a model for other communities in America.

While a number of news outlets covered the story, the coverage paled in comparison to the recent televised coverage of the street protests that accompanied the one year anniversary of Michael Brown's killing.

Does that which might be seen as the potentially negative hold more attraction for mainstream media than the sorts of positive systematic changes to the Ferguson court system ordered by Judge McCullin?

Sample of recent American "riot" headlines - [Photo - AJR]

The old media adage "If it bleeds it leads" seems to hold true these days.

In almost any American city where the potential for civil unrest or protest in the wake of the death of frequently-unarmed citizens of color occurs, a swarm of news trucks, photographers and reporters is quick to materialize; ready to beam carefully-edited images of people of color "rioting" out across the globe and chronicle chaos. 

That coverage is not always objective.



The ghosts of the devastating riots that erupted in cities across the nation in the wake of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 4, 1968 still haunt this nation; spawning something of a morbid cautionary fascination with many segments of mainstream media who always seem prepared to cover the worst of urban America when citizen outrage spills over into the streets.

On Monday, Judge McCullin's changes represented an important step in addressing some of that citizen outrage which still simmers in Ferguson.

Anger which can't be expected to simply vanish after decades of no legal redress and no prosecution for Darren Wilson for shooting and killing an unarmed black teen.

McCullin was unanimously appointed by the Ferguson city council back in June to replace Judge Roy Richter who'd been appointed by the Missouri Supreme Court in the wake of the release of the scathing review of the Ferguson courts and police department conducted by the Department of Justice.

McCullin's appointment was part of the comprehensive purge of the Ferguson court system to remove those who'd overseen its years of systematic and targeted abuse of the legal rights of thousands of African-American citizens.

On the law enforcement side, long gone are former Ferguson police chief Tom Jackson and other top officers from the department.

On the court side, also gone is the infamous Ferguson court clerk Mary Ann Twitty, the internal functionary who piously wielded her Magic Wand to make tickets disappear for friends and relatives, or processed the paper work for the thousands of bogus unjustified tickets (for crap like "Manner of Walking"), arrest warrants, inflated court fines and car seizures that overwhelmingly impacted black citizens. 

But while Judge McCullin's overhaul of the Ferguson courts illustrates an example of positive legal reform in an age where the issue of mass incarceration has now come under increased scrutiny, there's clearly still a long way to go.

The wheels of the court system's still grind against justice too.

Lead poisoned Baltimore row houses [Photo-Washington Post]

Terrence McCoy's truly disturbing article in yesterday's Washington Post chronicles how companies specifically target and profit of the lead poisoning of mostly poor African-Americans from Baltimore is an unfortunate reminder that the dysfunction of the American court system runs deep, and in many cases still functions as an accomplice to systematic discrimination based on race and ethnicity.

If you click the link above it's actually a difficult article to read.


As McCoy reveals in his article, companies like Access Funding methodically scour public court records of the financial court settlements awarded to mostly black victims of serious life-altering lead poisoning, then send smooth-talking representatives out into the streets of Baltimore to track them down like prey.    

Many of these lead poisoning victims suffer permanent, diminished intellectual capacity and debilitating mental side affects after years of exposure to the toxic lead paint common in row houses in poor sections of Baltimore like the ones seen in the photo above.

These unsuspecting victims are mislead and manipulated into signing away guaranteed-for life monthly settlement payments in exchange for sketchy one-time 'unstructured settlements' replete with complex contractual language and vague explanations of the financial terms.

In short, many are duped into signing away life-time benefits worth hundreds of thousands of dollars for paltry lump sums that translate into pennies on the dollar.

It's a moral, ethical and legal disgrace, but the companies do it routinely by filing legal documents in courts outside of Baltimore where there's less scrutiny of the terms allowing these companies to rip off people's medical benefits.

McCoy's Washington Post article is Pulitzer Prize-worthy material and not to be missed.

But more importantly it sheds light on the dark corners of the American legal system which continues to be an accomplice to the financial and legal victimization of people of color; a legal system that in this case, truly is blind.

More Ferguson Fallout As Two Officers Shot & Resignations Continue

The helmet of a Ferguson PD officer shot in the face

About the last thing the community of Ferguson needed was some cowardly deranged nut-bag (or nut-bags) shooting two members of the Ferguson Police Department after a peaceful protest the other night.

No question it was wrong and the overwhelming majority of people outraged over the killing of Michael Brown and the subsequent Department of Justice report were horrified by one or two deranged gunmen attacking police officers.

Fortunately, the two officers have been released from the hospital, let's hope they recover and those responsible are found and brought to justice.

What hurts about the two officers being shot, aside from the injuries these men suffered and the idea of law enforcement professionals being attacked, it's that the cities of St. Louis and Ferguson and the state of Missouri were in the process of taking concrete actions to address these wrongs and start to restore a measure of trust between the community and the police department.

Ferguson PD Sgt. William Mudd

The remarkably unaware police chief Tom Jackson has already announced his pending resignation as head of the embattled Ferguson Police Department, and Sgt. William Mudd (pictured left) and Captain Rick Henke have resigned as well.

It's painful, but fair to ask the obvious question:

Would those two police officers have ever been shot had the original investigation of Michael Brown's death and the flawed prosecution of former officer Darren Wilson been conducted in a manner consistent with basic judicial procedures and fairness in the first place?

Probably not.

But that said, the actions of one or two people don't erase the need for massive systematic change in Ferguson.

The DOJ report, the ongoing peaceful protests by Ferguson citizens, the global media scrutiny, the intervention by the federal government and the anger that sparked a mentally disturbed gunman (or gunmen) to shoot those two officers didn't happen in a vacuum.

They're all direct results of years of entrenched and intentional bias on the part of police, and a court system that placed the rampant use of that bias as a means to boost municipal revenue over fair judicial oversight of Ferguson citizens.

The efforts to dismantle the dysfunctional elements within the Ferguson court system are well underway as well; as evidenced by the firing of Court Clerk Mary Ann Twitty.

Ex-Ferguson judge Ronald Brockmeyer

Ferguson municipal judge Ronald Brockmeyer (pictured left) resigned after the Missouri State Supreme Court assigned Roy L. Richter, a judge from the St. Louis County Circuit Court to take over Ferguson's pending municipal court cases.

St. Louis Supreme Court Chief Justice Mary Russell expressed confidence in Richter's appointment, stating; "He is able and willing to implement needed reforms. Extraordinary action is warranted in Ferguson, but the Court also is examining reforms that are needed on a statewide basis."

Brockmeyer came under intense criticism in the wake of the release of the DOJ report for his questionable handling of municipal court cases.

The report specifically noted that Brockmeyer used his position as a judge and familiarity with municipal laws in a 'creative' manner to ensure that African-American defendants payed fees, court costs and penalties that far exceeded the seriousness of the relatively minor municipal infractions Ferguson PD officers aggressively targeted them for on a routine basis - at the same time that he was helping to make tickets issued to his friends or associates "magically disappear" with the help of Court Clerk Mary Ann Twitty.

Brockmeyer also announced his resignation as the prosecutor in the neighboring communities of Florissant and Vinita Park.

If you were to ask the average person, being a judge in one city, while also serving as a prosecutor in two different neighboring communities sounds pretty sketchy.

But from interviews I've heard on NPR, people simultaneously serving as judges and prosecutors in multiple communities surrounding the metro St. Louis area is not unusual, or illegal.

Based on details in the DOJ report it is ethically questionable and ripe for the kinds of systematic abuse that stirred so much outrage in the Ferguson community and around the globe.
   
It's likely that other police officials and municipal employees associated with the racist e-mails and other conduct identified in the DOJ report will resign or be fired as well in an effort to not only restore trust.

But to bring balance and fairness to the enforcement of law in a community still reeling from unarmed college-bound high school graduate Michael Brown (who had no prior record) being shot and killed by a policeman who used a vague "manner of walking" code violation to initiate a confrontation not for purposes of public safety; but to boost revenue for the city's coffers.

Months later innocent people, including two Ferguson police officers, are still paying the price.