Factoring in Family: Considerations of Parenthood in the Assessment, Enforcement and Collection of Legal Financial Obligations

This study explores the relationship between monetary punishment and parenthood from the perspectives of court and community corrections professionals. The authors rely on data from 205 semi-structured interviews with judges, attorneys, court clerks and probation officers in four states —Georgia, Minnesota, Missouri and New York– to examine how system-involved individuals’ family roles figure into the assessment and enforcement of legal financial obligations (LFOs). The authors find that system actors consider parental status in relation to LFOs and defendants’ ability to pay, though their decisions also hinge on gender and the nature of parental involvement. 

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Key findings: 

• System actors obtain and interpret information about defendant circumstances to (1) consider family complexity, (2) construct deservingness and (3) curb spill-over punishment. 
• Participants frequently discussed defendants’ number of children, though this was not always an established criteria in each state’s criminal legal system. Over half of participants mentioned numbers of children when describing socioeconomic circumstances and explaining how they attempt to reconcile personal obligations with LFOs imposed.  
• Interviews suggested that family size plays into decisions on fine amounts, alternatives to payment, and other discretionary LFO processes, in both routine and individualized ways.
• About 28 percent of participants discussed how defendants are expected to demonstrate a moral commitment to fulfilling their parental responsibilities if they are to be considered worthy of accommodating treatment by the court or community corrections.
• Data suggests ability-to-pay determinations and granting of waivers and reductions both explicitly and implicitly involve appraisals of defendants’ deservingness. 
• Parents who were perceived as deserving leniency from the court or community supervision were those that maintained a firm commitment to providing and caring for their dependent children.
• About 10 percent of participants construed leniency in assessment and enforcement as a way to mitigate the collateral effects of LFOs for the individual’s  children.