From the Editor - Prison Legal News

Cost Shifting (cont.)
www.census.gov/prod/2006pubs/p60-231.pdf.
31 Id.
32 The Census Bureau uses a set of money
income thresholds that vary by family size and
composition to determine who is in poverty. For
example, a family of four that includes two related
children under 18 the threshold amount is $19,806.
Income above this amount means the family is not
in poverty, while income below the sum means the
family is in poverty. For a list of the poverty thresholds
in 2005, see Carmen DeNavas-Walt, Bernadette
D. Proctor & Cheryl Hill Lee, U.S. Census Bureau,
Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in
the United States: 2005, 45 (2006), available at http://
www.census.gov/prod/2006pubs/p60-231.pdf.
33 Id. at 13-15.
34 Id. at 13-14.
35 As early as 1988, the National Institute
of Corrections observed that economic sanctions
against people involved in the criminal justice system
were expanding. Economic Sanctions Report at 1.
The number of states charging a probation fee, for
example, grew from 9 in 1980 to 24 in 1986. Id.
36 730 Ill. Comp. Stat. 5/5-5-10.
37 Kan. Stat. Ann. § 22-4529.
38 Minn. Stat. Ann. § 611.27.
39 Jon Wool & Don Stemen, Vera Institute of
Justice, Changing Fortunes or Changing Attitudes?
Sentencing and Corrections Reforms in 2003, 4
(2004).
40 Karen Imas & Rachel McLean, The Council
of State Governments Eastern Regional Conference,
Issue Brief, “Policymakers Discuss Practical
Solutions to Financial Obligations of People Released
from Prisons and Jails,” 2-3, May 2006. NIC
expressed this sentiment twenty years earlier in the
Economic Sanctions Report: “Concurrent with
these leaps has been an incremental growth resulting
from the piecemeal adoption of fees, program by
program, agency by agency.” Economic Sanctions
Report at 1.
41 Lauren E. Glaze & Thomas P. Bonczar,
U.S. Dep’t of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics,
Probation and Parole in the United States, 2005,
1 (2006), available at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/
pub/pdf/ppus05.pdf.
42 Economic Sanctions Report at iv.
43 Economic Sanctions Report at iv.
44 “In New York, and all across the country,
state legislatures are increasing existing fees, fines,
45
April 2008
and surcharges and creating new ones. Parole and
probation supervision fees, surcharges for convictions
of violations, misdemeanors, and felonies,
incarceration fees, and DNA databank fees are all
examples of financial penalties.” Center for Community
Alternatives, “Sentencing for Dollars: Policy
Considerations,” available at http://www.communityalternatives.org/articles/policy_consider.html.
45 Gabriel Jack Chin & Margaret Colgate
Love, Introduction to Symposium on the Collateral
Sanctions in Theory and Practice, 36 U. Tol.
L. R. ix (2005) available at http://law.utoledo.edu/
students/lawreview/volumes/v36n3/index.htm. The
American Bar Association recently recommended
that state “legislature[s] should collect, set out
or reference all collateral sanctions in a single
chapter or section of the jurisdiction’s criminal
code” in order to “provide the means by which
information concerning the collateral sanctions
that are applicable to a particular offense is readily
available.” Am. Bar. Ass’n, Standards for Criminal
Justice Section Standards, Collateral Sanctions
and Discretionary Disqualification of Convicted
Persons, Standards §§ 19-2.1, 19-1.2(a)(iii) (2006),
available at http://abanet.org/crimjust/standards/
collateral_blk.html.
46 Economic Sanctions Report at vii-viii.
47 For example in Washington “‘cost of
incarceration’ means the cost of providing an inmate
with shelter, food, clothing, transportation,
supervision, and other services and supplies as may
be necessary for the maintenance and support of
the inmate while in custody of the department . . .”
Dean v. Lehman, 18 P.3d 523, 533 (Wash. 2001).
48 Mark H. Bergstrom & R. Barry Ruback,
Economic Sanctions in Criminal Justice: Purposes,
Effects and Implications, 33 Crim. Justice & Behav.
242, 249 (2006).
49 Id. at 250.
50 According to the U.S. Department of
Justice Office for Victims of Crime, “nearly every
state has some form of general offender assessment,
penalty, or surcharge that all convicted defendants
must pay” that goes to funds set aside for victim
services or compensation. U.S. Dep’t of Justice,
Office for Victims of Crime, “State Legislative Approaches
to Funding for Victims’ Services,” Legal
Series Bulletin #9, 1 (2003), available at http://
www.ojp.usdoj.gov/ovc/publications/bulletins/
legalseries/bulletin9/ncj199477.pdf.
51 Lauren E. Glaze & Thomas P. Bonczar,
U.S. Dep’t of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics,
Probation and Parole in the United States, 2005, 1
(2006), available at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/
pub/pdf/ppus05.pdf.
52 Paige M. Harrison & Allen J. Beck, U.S.
Dep’t of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners
in 2005, 1 (2006), available at http://www.ojp.
usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/p05.pdf.
53 Id.
54 See fn. 66.
12
55 Id.
56 Id.
57 Id. at 6, tbl. 2.
58 Id. at 9, tbl. 6.
59 Barbara Krauth & Karin Stayton, U.S. Dept’
of Justice, Nat’l Inst. of Corr., Fees Paid by Jail Inmates:
Fee Categories, Revenues, and Management
Perspectives in a Sample of U.S. Jails, 1 (Connie Clem,
ed., 2005) (hereinafter referred to as “NIC Jail Fees
Report”), available at http://nicic.org/Downloads/
PDF/Library/021153.pdf.
60 Id. at 4. “Responses were received from jurisdictions
in 28 states and the District of Columbia.
. . .” Id.
61 NIC Jail Fees Report at 6.
62 NIC Jail Fees Report at 15.
63 Id. at 15-16.
64 NIC Jail Fees Report at 2. Id.
65 U.S. Dep’t of Justice, Nat’l Inst. of Corr.,
Fees Paid by Jail Inmates: Findings From the Nation’s
Largest Jails, Special Issues in Corrections, 2
(February 1997), available at http://www.nicic.org/
pubs/1997/013599.pdf.
66 Kentucky law requires prisoners to reimburse
“costs of confinement.” See Ky. Rev. Stat. Ann. §
441.265 (“a prisoner in a county jail shall be required
by the sentencing court to reimburse the county for
expenses incurred by reason of the prisoner’s confinement
as set out in this section, except for good cause
shown.” Id. § 441.265(1). In Campbell County, jailors
confiscate an initial $20 from an arrestee’s possessions
and subsequently deduct 25 percent daily from inmate
accounts as reimbursement for costs of confinement, up
to $50 per day, and a mandatory $30 “booking fee.” In
neighboring Kenton County, jailors deduct 50 percent
from a prisoner’s account until charges are paid in
full. See Sickles v. Campbell Cty, 439 F. Supp. 2d 751,
752 (E.D. Ky. 2006); see also Plaintiff’s Class Action
Complaint and Jury Demand, Sickles v. Campbell Cty.,
2005 WL 1530654 at 13 (May 17, 2005).
67 Paul A. Long, Judge OKs seizing inmates’
money, Kentucky Post, July 25, 2006.
68 The federal Bureau of Prisons requires
prisoners in its facilities to pay their “cost of incarceration,”
and runs the “Inmate Financial Responsibility
Program” (IFRP), which ostensibly “encourages each
sentenced inmate to meet his or her legitimate financial
obligations [by assisting] the inmate in developing a
financial plan for meeting those obligations.” Program
Statement: Financial Responsibility Program, Inmate,
U.S. Dep’t of Justice, Federal Bureau of Prisons, §
545.10-1 (Aug, 15, 2005). The IFRP requirements
do not apply to pretrial or detainee prisoners. Id. §
545.10-6.
69 18 P.3d 523 (Wash. 2001).
70 Id. at 526. Specifically, it permitted deduction
of 35 percent of such funds, re-routed as follows:
(i) Five percent to the public safety and
education account for the purpose of crime victims’
compensation;
(ii) Ten percent to a department personal inmate
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