Carrying Criminal Justice Debt

Navigating the American criminal justice system can feel like being shackled to a ghost—its penalties linger long after time served. That's what we're unpacking today on Lockdown Legacy, with a focus on the often unseen anchor of criminal justice debt. As Remie  and Debbie weave in the transformative journeys of those entangled in a system where financial burdens act as invisible bars, long after release.

The shadow of collateral sanctions casts a long, dark shape across the land of the free. We celebrate the strides of friends emerging from incarceration, but we also acknowledge the steep climb they face, weighed down by punitive debts. From the garnished wages of a Californian health aide to the seemingly interminable probation debt of a Kansas teenager, we confront a system that demands a pound of flesh in fines and fees, often crippling the very citizens it purports to rehabilitate. These aren't just tales of injustice; they're a call to acknowledge the individuals caught in a merciless cycle of debt.

Our closing thoughts turn to the "pay-to-stay" phenomenon, a fiscal maze that entraps former inmates with bills for their bed and board behind bars. With insights from the Vera Institute, we challenge the stark disparities that these practices amplify, and advocate for legal reform with the same fervor we apply to our Whole30 pursuits. It's not just about identifying the cracks in the system—it's about laying the foundation for a system that supports, rather than punishes, its most vulnerable. Tune in for an episode that's as much about the heart as it is about change.

Articles from this episode are listed below:
-Vera Institute main article:
https://www.governing.com/policy/the-long-and-unequal-burden-of-criminal-justice-debt
Vera Institute supporting article:
https://www.vera.org/publications/a-matter-of-time

Please, if you guys would like to help out with Remie's friend Katie who is currently in ICU fighting for her life, please consider donating at the following GoFundMe link:
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-katies-fight-mother-unborn-childs-battle?utm_campaign=m_pd+share-sheet&utm_medium=copy_link_all&utm_source=customer

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:19

Welcome to Lockdown the Legacy stories from the inside out. I'm your host, remy Jones.

Speaker 2: 0:25

And I am co-host Debbie Jones. We are a husband and wife team here to bring you the real life stories, experiences and questions around the American criminal justice system. We do advise discretion with this podcast. I think we should put that out there first and foremost. Yes, we are going to talk about experiences that happen inside the prison system, outside of prison systems. We will use language that might be offensive, but we intend to keep it real. And if that's not for you, we totally understand, but please do what's best for your listening ears.

Speaker 1: 0:56

Oh, we're about to keep it real, son. Our goal of this podcast is to share the inside realities of the American prison and criminal justice system, from pre-charges all the way to post-release, from the voices of those who've experienced it firsthand, including me.

Speaker 2: 1:12

That's right, we're going to get into it.

Speaker 1: 1:30

What's up everybody? Welcome back to another episode of Lockdown Legacy. As usual, I'm your host, remy Jones.

Speaker 2: 1:37

I am co-host Debbie Jones.

Speaker 1: 1:39

The beautiful, the talented, the smartest person I know and the person I'm so happy and fortunate to have in my life. Please excuse my rickety chair. You guys are going to hear that a lot throughout this episode, but that's all right. Man Big Boss decided to take the comfy chair.

Speaker 2: 1:58

Yeah, it's my turn. I always have to sit in that chair you deserve it.

Speaker 1: 2:02

She doesn't sit in this chair all the time. You guys never hear this chair.

Speaker 2: 2:07

Does that say more about me or you?

Speaker 1: 2:10

Anyways, just a quick share of what's going on in our lives. We are on a weight loss journey. We talked about it for a while At the end of last year. We got some physicals done for work and decided that we needed some lifestyle changes. Of course, the researcher over here, dj, decided hey, here's this whole 30 diet we should try, and me being a husband, I was like yeah, all right.

Speaker 2: 2:44

I'd like to offer some corrections. I don't think it's a weight loss journey so much as a lifestyle change.

Speaker 1: 2:50

I wouldn't call it a diet, but I didn't come up with that plan Changing our diet, not going on a diet.

Speaker 2: 3:00

My blood draws showed potential allergens and so I was told to cut out things like gluten and dairy for a little bit to see what was causing the allergies. Friend of the pod. Marsha, my friend was actually the person who recommended the whole 30 and starting there.

Speaker 1: 3:21

Oh, which made me look like an ass.

Speaker 2: 3:24

I got to cut that out.

Speaker 1: 3:28

Either way, I got some secondhand information. Dj's the one that passed along to me and was like, hey, we should do this. She did tell me it came from Marsha, so my bad for that oversight, but either way, I'm glad we started it. This is supposed to be like a 30 day thing, hence the name Whole30. I'm actually considering prolonging it. Man, the changes have been astounding. At the three week mark, which we're not supposed to do, but I, being ever so curious, weighed myself and I was mind boggled. I thought it was a mistake. My scales broke because after three weeks I had lost 17 pounds and hadn't even worked out. I saw diet change and making better, healthier choices. That's amazing. I used to be really into working out and I've done some extreme things to lose weight and I've never lost 17 pounds in three weeks.

Speaker 2: 4:38

The Whole30 is. I mean for those who are interested, as always. If you're not, this is Skippers Paradise. Please go ahead and skip on forward to our program and content. We're going to do better. We know that we said we were going to take breaks and then we didn't really implement that. There will be a pause before we start our content so that folks know that's where you pick up and hit play again. Accessibility. Anyway, the Whole30 is. I don't know, some folks might find it restrictive, but you remove gluten, you remove dairy, you remove alcohol. Whole30 requires removal of things like beans and corn Wheat yeah, wheat.

Speaker 1: 5:24

And basically anything with a scientific name on the label and the ingredients section.

Speaker 2: 5:28

As well as added sugar. So those are some pretty big things. So when I told my dad that this is what we were doing, he was like so what do you eat? He was like you cut out everything, so what do you eat? But we've eaten a lot of really great things. This is a non-paid shout out to ButcherBox. They do not sponsor us in any way, shape or form, but we have been getting a ButcherBox subscription for the last two months and they're great. They deliver really great cuts of meat that don't have preservatives, meats that are uncured, things like that, so you're not getting any of that added sugar into those cuts of meat. So we eat meat and we pair it with two veggies. Pretty regularly For lunches I've been prepping dairy-free soups, so this week we had an Italian wedding soup, which is one of my favorite soups.

Speaker 1: 6:23

It was really good.

Speaker 2: 6:25

Yeah, it was one of my favorite soups generally, but we've done some other things. There are other ways to add cream to a potato soup and things like that, so we found a lot of really good recipes. I think we learned pretty early on when we were doing our grocery shopping that it's really hard to find things that don't have added ingredients or that don't have sugar in them. There are a lot of things that you wouldn't think would have sugar, or shouldn't really have sugar, that had sugar in them Sausage.

Speaker 1: 6:57

I mean, there was like really weird stuff was like sugar added. And I just couldn't understand why. Because that should only be one ingredient. Have like 10 ingredients.

Speaker 2: 7:08

I mean especially things like frozen veggies. You think you'd be safe just buying a bag of frozen vegetables, but there were all kinds of additional things in it to preserve the life of your frozen vegetables, and so it was like, okay, we're better off just getting the fresh version and making it ourselves. So it's taken a lot of research, I guess, but it's been manageable. I haven't felt overwhelmed with not having food options. We have plenty to snack on. We're eating like nuts, dried fruit, rx bars, lara bars. There's a lot of apples, bananas. I eat a banana every day. I still drink my coffee in the morning.

Speaker 1: 7:48

I eat a lot of mixed nuts, dried fruit. My dad, when I told him about it he was pretty shocked too. Like well, that's a lot of label reading. And it was like, really, it was a lot of label reading in like the first week.

Speaker 1: 8:03

There was a lot of cravings in the first week. By the time we got to like week two, and then, especially a week three, it was like, man, I haven't even thought about sweets, like I'm making food for my kids, and in week one I was tempted to take a bite or eat it if they didn't want to eat it, or whatever. By week three it was like, yeah, go ahead and get rid of that and put this over here, and it was just like not even a thought to be tempted by it. I can't honestly say the only dirty thing I did was check the crumble app.

Speaker 1: 8:40

They just drool over their cookie advertisement and just like put it away Like I hope nobody saw that, but anyway, it's been a great, great journey, man. The health benefits are great. I've noticed even like an improvement in my memory and my energy and like my cravings and stuff. I virtually have no cravings anymore and if I do, instead of making a bad choice like I get one of those RX bars or lower bars. They're basically just fruit you know, and it cures that sweets craving. But other than that, you still want to go into that some more Mm-mm.

Speaker 2: 9:21

Well, other than that we're feeling good.

Speaker 1: 9:24

Our oldest daughter is doing great. She finally decided to do swim competitively and she's rocking it.

Speaker 2: 9:31

Yeah, I was really thrilled. She had a meet last weekend and everybody came. We are very, very fortunate to have so much family close by, so we had lots of grandparents there, siblings came. You were able to get off of work in time to see an event.

Speaker 1: 9:48

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 9:51

And then my aunt came, which this is my trigger warning particularly to my aunt, as she is a listener of the podcast that you may want to skip ahead a couple of minutes, because I do want to thank our listeners. So here's your cue. I would like to thank our listeners for I don't know, just thinking of us, sending your prayers, your love, your support, your checking in just to see how we're doing after the loss of my uncle a few weeks ago. I've said it a lot to folks in the last few weeks that grief is not linear.

Speaker 2: 10:30

Some days are good and other days are bad, and I see that with my aunt and with my parents and just people who loved my uncle, and I think that they're going to come points as the year goes on I mean, in as many years from now go on that it's going to be like man, he should really be here to experience this thing, or it's not the same without him. But right now we're just kind of continuing to cling to each other and my aunt came to our oldest daughter's swim meet and our daughter called her and asked her personally to come and was like I really want to invite her to come and watch and I didn't expect her to feel up to that or anything like that. But she came and it was really great to spend some time with her like that and, you know, put aside the sadness and things like that for just a little bit to really cheer her on and spend time together and go out to eat and all of that.

Speaker 1: 11:38

So thank you everybody for your support too, and that and us dealing with that and the family. Before we move on to brighter subjects, I would like to ask your support once again. I have a really close friend from my previous employment and he's currently his family is currently going through some stuff right now. His girlfriend, who happens to be pregnant, just suffered a brain aneurysm and stroke and she was found out collapsed in the snow trying to shovel the driveway. So that is really intense, especially after you know what we've been going through in our family just recently. There's currently a go fund me for her family and you know she has other kids and stuff.

Speaker 1: 12:34

So if you guys could, please, I'll post the link in the show notes and I'll also post them on every other episode too. So if you could, you know anything that you guys would like to donate please, it'd be very well received and appreciated. And also, you know, if you could give out prayers you know thoughts, positive thoughts, whatever that'd be great. And in the in the go fund me post, it'll give some more background and everything about them. So I won't, you know, repeat it here, but I guess that's it.

Speaker 2: 13:15

If you're thinking about Warren too. He is recovering. This was, this is normally Warren's spot, and so maybe you have started to hit play, dear listener, and you were like these are not the people that I signed up to hear this week and you were ready for Warren, and we understand, we were ready for Warren too, but he's feeling under the weather a little bit, and so we're going to give his vocal some time in his body, some time to just just arrest us as he should, and hopefully next week he'll be back with his you know, bi-monthly wisdom for us all. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 13:47

So onto a little bit more positive news. Before we get to the subject, I still want to give a little more updates. I got a couple of friends on the inside that are very hopeful for getting out. One of them just got his phase two hearing, so he'll be back in court to get an early release. No one just got out after doing 14 years. So shout out to them, and I'm looking forward to see good stuff for him.

Speaker 2: 14:14

Yeah, reentry is hard. I think what your friends have the benefit of is you, and I think that that's really helpful to try to navigate, especially when somebody's done a long time in prison. What do you call that? Doing a bid?

Speaker 1: 14:34

Yeah, we did the bid.

Speaker 2: 14:35

Yep, now you know this next phase is tricky too, but a lot of great things going on with folks on the inside, and so any chance we get we're going to amplify those things.

Speaker 1: 14:50

Yeah, and the small accomplishments are pretty big accomplishments. When you first get home, you know stuff like finding housing and finding a job, getting clothing it's like that's huge, especially after doing, you know, a decade or more. So when we shine lights on that, you know, please don't think that it's not a big deal, because it really is so. Okay, we'll leave that behind and we'll get to another section, the subject of today's episode.

Speaker 2: 15:26

And here's where we will pause. And now we're back.

Speaker 1: 15:39

And now we're back. Thanks for sticking around. If you skip, that's all right, but here we are. The subject for today's episode is actually I don't even know what to call it.

Speaker 2: 15:53

But basically I would call it the burden of criminal justice debt.

Speaker 1: 15:59

Yes, the burden of criminal justice debt. That was a pretty good thing you did there, which is just looking at the title of the article Right On these notes that we have All right.

Speaker 1: 16:12

So we're rating from an article actually two articles from the Vera Institute of Justice, which you guys know is going to be, you know, a resource of ours pretty regularly. They do pretty solid research and always have something good to talk about. So this article, of course, is about the burden of criminal justice debt, and it is something that is often not seen when you look at the sentencing aspect of criminal justice.

Speaker 2: 16:48

And we did an episode close to the beginning of the podcast called collateral sanctions. And so there was a little bit of this discussion in this, but we wanted to obliter, we wanted to devote, I guess, some intentional time to covering this specific collateral sanction. And before we jump in, do you want to define collateral sanction?

Speaker 1: 17:09

So collateral sanctions are basically the consequences that you have to deal with from you know the fallout of committing a crime and being sentenced that don't fall in with the purview of your sentence. For instance, having to check the box when you go for employment telling them that you're a felon, or when you have to check the box when you go for housing, or you know not being able to own firearms. You know having to deal with court costs, fines and etc. Those are all considered collateral sanctions. It is guaranteed that you will have some if you go through a criminal justice system. You cannot avoid them in any way. But they're not really what's the word. It's not a cookie cutter thing. It's not consistent from person to person.

Speaker 2: 18:09

Or state to state, or crime to crime, or, you know, local state, federal charge.

Speaker 1: 18:16

And that's very unfortunate because that makes it very vague when you come to wonder what to expect. For instance, there is I read an article I can't remember what it was on but they were talking about sex offenders in Florida. And of course, when people hear sex offenders, of course you lose all sympathy, right. But you know, if you put the crime aside and you say, okay, they did their time and they're coming home, you know, everybody knows about a sex offender registry Well, there are so many places in Florida where they can't live, or if they're moving in and the neighbor complains so they have to move out, that basically they started a whole like homeless village you know, and the state kind of like didn't want to do anything about it because they were violating their probation terms by doing this, by not having a place to stay where their probation officer could come and check up on them.

Speaker 1: 19:22

So the state kind of just turned a blind eye and left them build this village of homeless people and even encouraged their POs to like go and check up on them there. Wow, so when you talk about the extremes of collateral damage, like you know, that's it. And in other cases it's like like we're talking about now court costs and fines when it comes to not being consistent. In my case alone, I got like $5,000 worth of court costs and fines and my I can't call them a co-defendant because we didn't share the case but a person I got in trouble with who were on the very same charges, or very similar charges, got like $50,000 worth of court costs and fines and it's like how does that happen? How do two people who virtually commit the same crimes get such drastically different sentences?

Speaker 1: 20:21

Right, you know, and it's basically like you're at the mercy of the judge, the prosecutor and whatever they see fit. If they think you have more resources, you know, like the only way to get out of it is to be seen as indigent in the court's eyes, which means like you can't afford it. You know you got a court to pay a appointed lawyer and whatever else, but if you have a paid lawyer you can't be considered indigent. So instantly, once you have a court of a paid lawyer, you're getting hit with court costs and fines because they want to recoup the cost of prosecuting you.

Speaker 2: 20:55

Right.

Speaker 1: 20:56

If you have a defined victim and they decide that they want you to pay restitution to a victim, especially if it's a property crime, then they're charging that straight to you. If you crash somebody's car and they say, oh, you got to pay $50,000 in restitution even though that person only paid a $500 deductible, like that's going on you and they make you pay while you're in prison. They take the money out of your state pay and any money that hits your books and then they also make you pay when you get home. And that's another place where we're talking about the inconsistencies from state to state.

Speaker 2: 21:37

And so terms you might hear as we continue to talk about this are legal financial obligations, which are LFOs, but you also might hear statute of limitation, which is S-O-L. And then when we're thinking about these criminal justice debts, we're talking about those criminal fines, those fees, those restitutions, and really, you know, as Remy was describing these different incidences, I think it's easy to fall into the category of so you did the crime, you got to pay that back, right. But what we're talking about I think we could liken to student debt. Maybe I think what most individuals who are arguing for student debt relief are arguing for is not that individual shouldn't have to pay back money that they borrowed. But then, when you add interest in all of these fines and fees on top of that, people are literally so poor that they have two or three jobs to make that student loan payment.

Speaker 2: 22:35

Similarly, with criminal fees, with restitution, these things, there is no statute of limitation or S-O-L on that. So as long as you owe it, you have it to pay back, even if your checks are being garnished and things like that, it's again kind of paying this consumer debt minimum. So if you think of that student loan or that credit card payment where these fines are getting stacked on top of each other, it's very, very difficult to pay back, and one of the things that stuck out to me is the median statute of limitation for criminal fines and fees is 40 years 40. While the median statute of limitation for civil judgment is 10 years. So it's like these really, really big periods of time where you have to pay back this thing, and if it's drawn out over 40 years, there are just people who are getting their paychecks garnished for decades or having to do other things to make sure that this debt gets paid, because if it doesn't, then what's your favorite thing to talk about?

Speaker 1: 23:45

Or set ofism, you will get what's called a technical violation on your probation If you're on active probation or parole and you can't pay.

Speaker 1: 23:56

I think it's like two months If you get two months behind, you're automatically in violation.

Speaker 1: 24:02

But when you're talking about 40 years, like obviously you're not on probation or parole anymore and yet you still are under the pressure to pay or go back to prison for something you could have done 35 years ago and I always like to look at it as the person I was 10 years ago is not the person I am today.

Speaker 1: 24:27

Anything I did 10 years ago like if you're still holding that against me, like shame on you, and no judge or prosecutor looks at it like that. Like if I held every judge and prosecutor to the standards of who they were when they were 19, going through college, having raves and drinking too much, underage drinking, whatever else, and I said okay, that defines your character for the rest of your life. All of them will be shamed. And yet here I am as a 60 year old, possibly like damn, if I can't make this payment, like I'm going to go back to prison. And so now you're making a person who could have possibly totally changed their lives in a positive manner, start to consider negative possibilities. They're like well, damn what can.

Speaker 1: 25:17

I do to get some money real quick so I can pay this. Fine, Now you got people committing crimes again just so they could pay the judge.

Speaker 2: 25:28

That actually came up in the survey is folks who are anonymously surveyed in the re-entry side of things were saying I have had to commit crimes to pay money for my crime, my original crime, because I didn't have enough and had to decide between things like paying my essentials for myself or my family or missing this payment over here. So it's it's. People are faced with these really big crossroads and, unlike things like civil debt or consumer debt, there is no bankruptcy option. There is no repayment plan or income driven repayment plans or like save plans or student loan forgiveness plan, like there is no way to say hey, this happened 30 years ago and I'm still continuing to pay it and I can't get out from underneath of this. What options do I have? The options are you don't have any. Your paycheck continues to get garnished until the state, the federal government, the whomever gets what they are. Quote-unquote owed and this.

Speaker 1: 26:39

This is interesting because In this study by the Vera Institute, they Uncovered that states don't actually have financial gain off of pursuing people for these debts. Oftentimes they spend more money than what is owed to collect them. And when you're talking about somebody you know, 20, 30 years out, they're like dude, you don't get that money. When you get it, I mean because the state I mean everybody know the government, they government want theirs, right, so they don't give a fuck what's going on in your life. They don't care if you got kids. They don't care about your personal consumer debt. They don't care if, oh, oh, your kids going to college, you just pay no care, like, oh, you going through a divorce, I don't care. You lost your job, I do not care.

Speaker 1: 27:36

Oh, you got child support coming out of your check already too. Well, we're gonna take ours first. You know, and it's not based off of how much you panning child support, okay, how much you making. It's like nah, we want this. You know, however much a month if you can't afford that and if that makes it so that you can't eat literally you can't buy groceries, they don't care. You know, which is very unfortunate, because Me personally, if I loaned you some money and I knew that the cost of paying it back would make your kids starve. I'd be like man, don't worry about it.

Speaker 1: 28:11

You know, you know but you know that's not how it works and instead of relieving that debt, we would rather go and spill, spend millions on, you know, helping starving children and underprivileged homes, while we are the reason why they are underprivileged, you know? Anyway, I don't know. Here are two examples given in this article and one of them says you know, in Alabama A military veteran bears the burden of a 20 year old criminal justice debt that has only increased since it was imposed. Also in California, home health aides he's her paycheck garnish for a decade to pay back costs of her time spent in jail. That is stupid. And also they give a third example of a, a high school student in Kansas, who accrues juvenile probation debt that will never expire right.

Speaker 2: 29:13

So this is impacting children too, like that's the. That's the reality of it, and I also think that you know what benefit is this right? Because you've already talked about the states don't really Consider these pieces of restitution, these fines that they're imposing. I mean, I'm not talking about victim restitution, so I want to make that really clear. I'm talking about the fines and fees in restitution that the state claims that they are owed or the federal Government claims that they are owed, like these components for a court-appointed lawyer, right for having to set a court date.

Speaker 2: 29:47

These Dollars don't typically impact the Courts themselves, right? They're not paying personnel with that, they're not covering their overhead with these things. So A what's not clear in the study is what do those fees then go for? Right, like, how are those things actually broken up and what? What line item in a budget is that? So that's a question mark for me.

Speaker 2: 30:13

But also, I mean, it couldn't be good that criminal debt exists, right, like neither for the debt holders themselves or the collectors. So one might think it's ideological and there's a disparity with that. But what the Vera Institute found was that was just not the case. They found no relationship between a state's incarceration rate or its partisan leaning. So there isn't any drive there from a red side or a blue side. You know those invisible lines that very much exists, like, for example, they they talk about that there are deep red, red states that have brief repayment periods and then deep blue states with really, really laborious ones and many, many combinations in between. So, as we said at the top, of the content is there is no consistency, which is a Fault in and of itself when we talk about equitable Criminal justice reform. This is one of the big pieces, because when it's messy, when it is ambiguous, when there is no standard, it's really hard to make any change. It's really hard to Advocate against, because who are you advocating against? Colorado, new Mexico? Know who you're going after.

Speaker 1: 31:37

Whose fault is this petition to?

Speaker 2: 31:40

like in your example, those are two individuals that are sentenced almost at the same time in Ohio, in the same court by the same judge, right so?

Speaker 1: 31:49

well, actually no, we had different judges. That's why I said we weren't actually co-defendants on the same case. We had different judges and everything but even though show the exact point of inconsistency, right? Because if one judge is like man, this is a messed up situation you guys were involved in and you were just misguided youth, yeah. And the other judge is like I'm going tough on crime because I want to get elected again. Yeah and they're like I'm gonna make you pay, that you know right.

Speaker 2: 32:19

And so it's these inconsistencies in the same quarter, in the same state, in you. So it's those things are what make this really hard to combat and what makes it, excuse me, worse is that many states Don't even have any kind of LFO statutes To rely on, so there isn't a precedent. It's solely up to interpretation of those who are, you know, setting the restitution, which make it really really difficult. That's exactly what we're describing here. So when, when it's messy, when it's Unclear, when there is no like okay, if I say this, then I follow this line to hear on the flow chart or whatever.

Speaker 1: 33:01

It makes this completely inequitable as a practice and it makes it totally impossible to Petition relief because you have absolutely no case law to quote.

Speaker 1: 33:13

Mm-hmm you know, basically you're going to another judge and saying please don't think like that judge, thought like can you please help me? You know right, instead of being like hey, they didn't go by this rule and this guideline and this section, you know, there's really nowhere to point to and that's really messed up. And it's really messed up. And I one of the things I thought was really interesting in this article is that they found that in states that had shorter statues of limitations, there was more repayment than in states with longer statues Statues of limitations.

Speaker 2: 33:56

Well, to me that's much that's based on motivation, right Like if I know I got a debt for 40 years.

Speaker 1: 34:03

Yeah, you like I got time, I'm not worried.

Speaker 2: 34:06

Or I'm, or I'm pissed about it like I mean. You'll get your money when you get your money right. Like there is no, there's no motivator there for me to try to pay it off early. There's no, there's no. Okay, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel because in five years from now, this will all be over, or anything like that like you take away people's drive and motivation to want to see this off of their plate.

Speaker 2: 34:32

When you say we don't have An SLL for this, like it's just, whenever it's paid back, it's paid back, I would be like, alright.

Speaker 1: 34:40

Well, to make an interesting point, already more interesting, at the end of the statute, the limitations, even if you have been paying, they write off the remainder of it. They just totally dismissed the debt. So if you got you know 30 grand to pay back and you've been paying, you know $300 a month, and then you're like, oh, I just got an income tax return here's you know two hundred two thousand dollars or whatever, and then you hit the end of the statute limitations, you still got a Ten grand balance. They're like, don't worry about it, which is awesome because even though you've been on top of it, you feel like, whoo man, that's what's up. But if you're that person who's been like, dude, it's a 40 year statute of limitations and it's been 30 years and now I can't pay in or tumble to send me back, do you're like man fucking?

Speaker 2: 35:35

Discounting the states that have unlimited in terms of their statutes of limitation for Fines and fees. Again, I'm not talking about restitution to a victim here, solely about these fines and fees component. There are several. Do you want to count those real quick? How many have unlimited here? That's a. That is a Quick, can you?

Speaker 1: 35:54

count. So there's just different, though there's unlimited for fines and fees and there's unlimited for restitution.

Speaker 2: 36:00

Oh, I'm just talking fines and fees. I believe in you. You can do this. While you do that, I'm gonna say that the one that has the longest SOL, that's defined is okay. So there are 27 unlimited. Okay. Back to what I was saying. The one that has the longest, that's defined, is 65 years, 65 years and that is the state of Iowa.

Speaker 1: 36:36

Who the fuck came up with that number?

Speaker 2: 36:38

I'm not sure, like, why didn't they just make it unlimited, if they were gonna go as high as 65, virginia is not much better, there's a 60.

Speaker 1: 36:47

So I read that I was kind of disappointed as your home state. Now I was gotta go back home and let them know that that's ridiculous but I've long known that Virginia, and actually most Commonwealth states in general, have some really just ridiculous laws.

Speaker 2: 37:04

So I think that as we begin to think about this you know, the components we haven't talked about are from an equity lens, as we have long preached on this podcast as long as existed in All kinds of research all over the place we have to think about race in terms of disproportionality in prison Rates.

Speaker 2: 37:29

We know that black and brown bodies are Largely the prison population, disproportionately so, and as research tells us, for things that are Less Intense, what's the severe?

Speaker 2: 37:47

Severe, then white counterparts, and I think that's really important to continue to bring to the focus, because, but as we talk about criminal justice reform, we would be really remiss to say, hey, here is another example of how we are continuing to keep black and brown people oppressed within this country. Not only are we disproportionately Sentencing you to longer, longer time in prison for Crimes that don't deserve 35 year sentences, etc. But also when you come home, you're not really free because we're going to impose these fees and fines repayment for an unlimited and undescribed amount of time until it's paid back, or 65 years or you know, like these Really lengthy things. It's hard for anybody to come out on the other side of that, like come up out of that, and so when we think about who lives in poverty, who lives in homelessness, who is continuous, continuously restricted by these collateral sanctions, we have to make mention every single time that that is disproportionately black and brown bodies.

Speaker 1: 39:04

Yeah, straight up now there is something that I wanted to, kind of it just popped into my mind and it actually falls outside of this article, kind of falls within the subject, though, and that is like in the past ten years, states just far and wide have been catching on and taking this idea of pay to stay, which starts as soon as the county jail and goes into Private prisons.

Speaker 1: 39:40

Of course, the state doesn't do that in their prisons, but private prisons are notorious for it, and so, basically, notoriously, in states like California Ohio actually does some of the county jails in Ohio actually do pay to stay now, and so, basically, if you get money on your books, on your account in the jail or in the prison, they will deduct monthly, basically, rent. You have to pay to stay in prison. Even in, like some of county jail in Ohio, when I was in there, they like drastically reduced the quality of the meals and implemented an outside vendor to supply basically like takeout food, so you could order a burger and fries for $15 or you could eat the slop that was coming out. That was, like you know, just horrible and quality, and If you got money put on your books, there was no option. They were going to take their cut for your stay and they would. They would impose it in court costs and fines and all types of stuff like it's. It's ridiculous how like they legitimately turn Criminal justice and incarceration into a money grab it is.

Speaker 2: 41:08

It's a multi-million dollar corporation. Basically, at the you know mind, it might as well make it like a fortune 500 or, you know, like it's just. It's Atrocious how much this system Works to profit off of individuals who don't have it right.

Speaker 1: 41:27

Like I mean it's modern-day slavery. That's the other thing is, in a state like California, when you think about all the gang violence and stuff like that they struggle with, if you have the option of going to and this is all about class and race right, if you get incarcerated and I can get incarcerated, and we're of two different races and classes and you can't go to, you can afford to go to a pay-to-stay prison Much better living conditions, food and all that stuff because you have the money to pay for it.

Speaker 1: 41:58

Mm-hmm then you're going up there to live. You know, posh like Martha Stewart, and I'm getting fed to the wolves because I came before to go. So you know I mean it just ties right on in, like with the equity and Equality aspect.

Speaker 2: 42:14

Well, it just is similar to to bring it back to criminal debt post incarceration, just to tie the two together. I think the comment I would share is we just continue to make up rules without any kind of Codification and law about it, right? And so this pay-to-stay component of hey, you didn't ask to be here, but we're gonna charge you rent to be here anyway, and when you come home we're going to continue to garnish your wages to make back this money. That doesn't really impact our budget or operating lines at all. We're just doing it because you know, judge said so Continues to highlight just how inhumane our System is. And so, until something is codified in law regarding either one and you know this is done in a much more, what am I trying to say? Like a copy-paste way? What am I like templated?

Speaker 1: 43:21

Just.

Speaker 2: 43:23

Standardized way. I was gonna get there eventually. I was like what are the? What are the things that relate to this? But Until something is like created where it's standard across the bowl of the board board.

Speaker 1: 43:38

Thank you.

Speaker 2: 43:39

It's late, it's my bedtime, then we're going to continuously struggle with how we reform the system. So I think, do you have more to talk about?

Speaker 1: 43:54

Yeah, just, this is actually a personal encounter, I mean Whatever. So I remember when I was in, I was locked up in the county jail. I was actually coming back to coming back from prison to fight a case and there was a guy in there who did not want to go home on house arrest. They were telling them like oh, we're gonna let you out Because the prison is overcrowded, so we're just gonna put you on house arrest. And he was like no, I don't want to. And I didn't understand it at the time and he ended up explaining it to me later. And it was because if they put him on house arrest, they were gonna make him pay for it. And he was like I don't want to, I just do my time. And we're like nah, and they kicked him on a prison and made him pay for it. And he was like I can't afford that, you know, especially not after I just lost my job since I came to jail, like right, so I don't know, it's just really unfair. I Guess that is all wrap up.

Speaker 1: 44:56

I did have a couple of highlights, so this is also from the Vera Institute article. As compared to civil debts, criminal debts are subject to longer enforcement periods in 68 percent of our states and, as the example that DJ gave, like in Virginia, it is 60 years for you to pay back fines and fees. What? It's only 20 years for you to pay back civil debt, and some of them are even. The difference is even bigger where it's like seven years for civil judgments and you know, you know, 30, 40 years for criminal. So, um, that's pretty, it's pretty intense, man. Um, what was the other one you said? Um 34 of states outlined an unlimited period of enforcement for fines and fees on debts.

Speaker 1: 45:53

Right which we counted the lines, and they were about 27 states individually um, that sucks, man, that sucks, but, um, you know, as usual, this is something that we came about and we were like man, people got to know this. Like, the reason why we do this is to Share with you guys in society, because out in society, we are the people who have the power, um, to Bring this to light and make the change. So I mean, I mean, how many of you guys are going to actually pay attention to something like this when you're going to the voter booth when nobody knows about it?

Speaker 2: 46:31

really, and I mean at the end of the day. You know, we're talking about statistics, we're talking about state reform, we're talking about big system reform, but this is impacting individuals. These are individual people who are having to make decisions between Can I buy groceries for my family or should I pay my Fines and fees from court from 10, 15 years ago? Because if I don't do either one, there's huge implications. Like we talk about ethics and Ethics classes and and that's that's the ethical dilemma, right, is this paradox of what am I going to do to survive this week? Am I going to risk going back to prison and leaving my family, or am I gonna Pay this fine and then my family goes hungry? Like those are real life decisions Individuals are having to make because of how the system is set up right now.

Speaker 1: 47:22

It's a it's a domino effect too. I mean, because when you think about the Barriers that we mentioned in previous episodes, where it's like I come home from prison and I'm trying to get housing and I tell them I'm a felon, what landlord is going to be like? Yeah, I'll give you a chance if they know that at one point you're probably going to have to choose between paying your rent or paying the government.

Speaker 2: 47:44

Exactly right.

Speaker 2: 47:45

They're like no, I want to deal with those problems, you know and I mean I just can't imagine the mental health struggle that individuals have to then go through on a monthly basis to figure out which bills are going to pay. We already know the mental health cost of poverty. When we combine that with the mental health cost of collateral sanctions and poverty level incomes and ethical dilemmas of family, like the exacerbation people have to feel on their psyche is not talked about in this article, but we have to consider it because I'm sure it's astounding.

Speaker 1: 48:26

Yeah, and I, of course, am the one that's going to petition you guys, because I know personally that you don't have to look too far, no matter how high you rise in society, you don't have to look too far to to see somebody who is struggling with their encounter. You know, now or previously, with the criminal justice system and so, even if it's like, oh, my nephew so-and-so, it just can't seem to straighten up and get his life together, like you don't know the burden he's dealing with, trying to straighten his life up and still having to deal with the stuff he did previously. You know, right, it's not a clean slate. They're starting with right. So just you know, I'm always saying it like, please have mercy, be patient, you know.

Speaker 2: 49:13

I think to wrap us up, if you don't have any other comments, I'm cool with it All right.

Speaker 2: 49:17

Uh, this is a concluding thought from Steven Laurie um, who is an associate at the Vera Institute of Justice on the impact strategy team. And uh, stephen writes States interested in equity and justice ought to revise their statutes of limitations for criminal legal debt down to the gold standard for consumer debt Three years or at least equalize how debts from criminal and civil cases are treated, to ensure that enforcement of these debts is truly limited. These reforms should also extinguish outstanding debt Once the statute of limitations have expired. For the millions of people burdened by LFO debt years and even decades after the offense, this kind of relief is well past due. End quote.

Speaker 1: 50:01

Yeah, so, um, thank you everybody for listening. Um, this has been a very Interesting, thought-provoking article and I'm glad we got to share with you guys. I'm very glad to have the DJ with me.

Speaker 2: 50:17

Yeah, she gotta go bad, though she gotta go bad.

Speaker 1: 50:19

But I love having her with me and I know you guys love having her too. So no, no, it was fun.

Speaker 2: 50:23

It's not a burden. I don't want it to sound like that. I don't want it to sound like that. I just hear myself tripping on words and I'm like, oh, it's been up a long time. That's right, we do it out of love. That's right.

Speaker 1: 50:35

All right. So thank you everybody for tuning in. I'll see you next time, next week with mourn, and of course we're kicking up something good for you. So make sure you guys tune back in peace.

Speaker 2: 50:52

The lockdown to legacy podcast is proud to be a part of the bus sprout podcast community network. Lockdown to legacy is recorded at co-hatch in their lovely audiophile room. Thanks for your scholarship. Audio engineering is done by our very own remy jones. You can reach us with any feedback, questions, comments or share the love by emailing stories at lockdown, the number two legacycom, stories at lockdown to legacycom. You can reach out there too for a free sticker, and you can find us on instagram and twitter with the handle at lockdown to legacy and on facebook at the lockdown to legacy podcast. Thanks for listening.