Courts as Revenue Centers Archives - Page 4 of 18

Criminalizing Poverty: The Consequences of Court Fees in a Randomized Experiment

Using a randomized controlled trial of court related fee relief for misdemeanor defendants, the authors tested the hypothesis that financial obligations criminalize poverty and later court involvement results from an …

What is Wrong with Monetary Sanctions?: Directions for Policy, Practice, and Research

Each year tens of millions of people are assessed fines, fees, and other costs stemming from their contacts with the criminal legal system, ranging from felony convictions to traffic violations. …

Police In This Tiny Alabama Town Suck Drivers Into Legal ‘Black Hole’

Brookside, a small town in Alabama with 1,253 residents and six miles of roads to patrol, has more than doubled its town’s income as fines and forfeitures rose 640 percent …

It’s Time To Reform Washington’s Harmful System Of Fines And Fees

People with low incomes, disabilities, and Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) shoulder much of the harm from the legal financial obligations (LFOs) levied in Washington’s criminal legal system. …

Following the Money on Fines and Fees

The perceived legitimacy of the justice system and public safety may be undermined by the fiscal incentives resulting from states linking revenue from fines and fees to police and court …

Segmented Pricing For Fines and Fees

Local governments use fines and fees to discourage negative behavior and raise revenue. However, not everyone can afford to pay, leading to uncollected debt and harm to vulnerable communities. In …

More than half of Louisiana’s Public Defender Offices in The Red After COVID Shuttered Courts

Public defense in Louisiana is reliant on unpredictable conviction and user fees for the bulk of its funding. For the fourth year in a row, public defense offices have run …

County Dependence on Monetary Sanctions: Implications for Women’s Incarceration

As the overall incarceration rate has fallen in the United States, the incarceration rate for women has steadily risen in some areas. With the shift to legal financial obligations as …

Native Americans and Monetary Sanctions

Using an analysis of criminal court administrative data and in-depth interviews with decision-makers and defendants in Minnesota, the authors find that Native Americans are subject to the largest overall legal …

Unjust Revenue from an Imbalanced Criminal Legal System: How Georgia’s Fines and Fees Worsen Racial Inequality

Georgia’s localities are over-reliant on fines and fees revenue, making up more than 10 percent of their general revenue, while the national average among localities was two percent in 2018. …