There is progress in the battle against debtors prisons in Missouri.
On top of a that says defendants can鈥檛 be threatened with jail time for inability to pay 鈥渂oard bills鈥 issued for previous jail stays, and state lawmakers filing legislation to make it harder for counties to use the courts as a debt collector, several of the people I鈥檝e written about in recent months have received good news on their cases.
Here鈥檚 a year-end update on some of them:
St. Francois County
Richard Clark is getting a new prosecutor. Early this month, Circuit Court Judge Wendy Wexler-Horn granted a motion filed by Clark鈥檚 attorney, Jeffrey Ernst, to declare that Prosecuting Attorney Jerrod Mahurin had a conflict in the case and had to be removed. The reason for the conflict, , was that Mahurin committed 鈥減rosecutorial misconduct鈥 in the case. Clark, who is 59 and lives in Farmington, was charged with marijuana possession in 2015, and has already spent 495 days in jail, mostly because he couldn鈥檛 afford to pay bail. Mahurin lost his election in November, and was offered an opportunity by Wexler-Horn to avoid a hearing on Ernst鈥檚 motion, because come January, it would have been a moot point.
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Instead, Mahurin chose to argue the motion, and lost.
In response, he filed a motion seeking to remove Wexler-Horn from the case. Why? Mahurin argues that Wexler-Horn had a conversation in the days leading up to the election with Judge-elect Patrick King about 鈥渁ccusations made about the prosecutor by former disgruntled employees during that race.鈥
Steven Pritchett has a court date. For five years, Pritchett has been avoiding a warrant on a felony stealing case filed by Mahurin because he fears facing a fate similar to Clark鈥檚, ending up in jail on a bogus charge because he can鈥檛 afford a high cash bail. After in October, 狐狸视频 attorney Mark Bishop agreed to represent the 62-year-old ex-logger free of charge. Bishop filed motions to recall the warrant and dismiss the charges. Circuit Court Judge Tim Inman denied both motions but allowed a personal recognizance bond in the case. That means when Pritchett shows up for an arraignment in January, if the charge isn鈥檛 dropped, at least he won鈥檛 be going to jail.
Dent County
Lisa Blackwell is out of a job. The former head of the local private probation office no longer works for MPPS, the company owned by Community Services of Missouri. Blackwell used to in the courtroom of Associate Circuit Court Judge Brandi Baird, who lost her election in November. She was a controversial figure in Dent County. Numerous defendants who ended up in jail based on drug tests or other alleged probation violations believe Blackwell often looked for opportunities to find defendants in violation, because it made more money for the private probation company and also increased board bills owed to the county.
In December, Blackwell posted a sign on the door of MPPS in Salem that said the office would be closed for a month. The phone number on the sign referred people to the local prosecutor鈥檚 office, which in turn gave out the cellphone number of Judy Cowdry, owner of the private probation company.
In a phone interview, Cowdry, who lives in Lake Saint Louis, told me that Blackwell 鈥渏ust quit and left. I have no idea why.鈥
Perhaps it鈥檚 related to a tax lien filed by the state Department of Revenue against Blackwell and her husband in November. According to the court filing, the Blackwells owe the state $1,987 in back taxes.
Speaking of drug tests, those results are no longer being published online. Readers might recall , who, after being arrested on her first drug possession charge, faced potential violations of her pretrial release because MPPS posted allegedly positive drug tests on the state鈥檚 court case tracking website CaseNet. At the time, 狐狸视频 University law professor Brendan Roediger called the practice 鈥渄espicable鈥 and said it likely didn鈥檛 pass legal muster. In recent cases in Dent County, the drug tests are now posted on CaseNet as 鈥渄rug screens鈥 and no longer show whether they were positive or negative.
Lafayette County
Precious Jones has an attorney. Jones is the 狐狸视频 woman in Lafayette County on a speeding ticket, but faced a warrant for her arrest and a potential for an additional six months in jail, because on one of the weekends when she did her jail time, she was late to jail. Nonprofit public-interest law firm is now representing Jones, and the firm has filed a motion asking Associate Circuit Court Judge Kelly Rose to recall the warrant.
In another case overseen by Rose, the judge has released from any further 鈥減ayment review hearings鈥 for inability to pay the board bill he owes the county for time served in jail. Harris is indigent and represented by Matthew Mueller, the senior bond litigation counsel for the Missouri State Public Defender鈥檚 Office.
Mueller is the attorney who won the Court of Appeals case that said judges can no longer call defendants back month after month for payment review hearings to try to collect board bills. As 2018 comes to an end, he鈥檒l be keeping an eye on judges across the state, many of whom still have full dockets of such hearings still scheduled for late this year and early next year.
Jailed for being poor is Missouri epidemic: A series of columns from Tony Messenger
Tony Messenger has written about Missouri cases where people were charged for their time in jail or on probation, then owe more money than their fines or court costs.聽
The Pulitzer Prize board considered these columns when it decided to award the prize for commentary to metro columnist Tony Messenger.聽
In a twist of irony, one judge no longer calls them 鈥減ayment review hearings.鈥 Instead, he鈥檚 even more direct. Now they are called 鈥渄ebt colle…
鈥淭he jail is emptying out. People that do come in are able to bond out quickly. None of the girls here are being held for financial reasons. T…
In a case of civil contempt 鈥 such as when a judge jails a reporter for not revealing a source, or an attorney for failing to follow an order …
Even with the state鈥檚 top court making progress in eradicating the practice of putting people in jail because they can鈥檛 afford to be in jail,…
鈥淭here are a pile of cases where people owe us money,鈥 the judge told the defendant, a painter, who said he was having a hard time finding wor…
No longer, the court said in one voice, can judges in Missouri threaten indigent defendants with jail time for their inability to be able to a…
Disparate treatment of people charged with crimes offers a glimpse into a fundamental problem in the application of criminal justice in Missou…
Weiss wants the Legislature to make it illegal for counties to charge defendants for their time behind bars.
鈥淗ow can they cancel a court date then issue a warrant without even telling you the new court date?鈥 Sharp wonders.
His bill would stop the practice in Missouri of state police agencies avoiding state jurisdiction by seeking asset forfeiture under guise of f…
"He sat in jail because he was poor," public defender Matthew Mueller聽said of his client.
The two defendants are Exhibits A and B of why Missouri has become the front line in a national war on poverty and the courts.
She knows what she did was wrong. She knows she should have been punished.
鈥淚t's been a hard road,鈥 she told me recently. 鈥淩eally hard.鈥
For decades, Missouri鈥檚 corrections budget has been rising. So has its prison population, with a 鈥渢ough on crime鈥 philosophy filling prisons w…
鈥淲e鈥檙e hamstringing the very people who we want to go out and get a job,鈥 Lummus says. 鈥淚t鈥檚 self-defeating.鈥
In his regular appearance on the McGraw Milhaven show on KTRS radio, Metro columnist Tony Messenger discusses his ongoing debtors' prison series.
He did his time. Then he got the bill: $3,150 for his stay behind bars.
A year-end update on some of the cases Tony Messenger wrote about during 2018.
The primary difference between the poor people who have been 鈥渢errorized鈥 in Edmundson or Jennings or Ferguson, compared with those in Salem a…
The Court of Appeals in the Western District of Missouri determined that the practice of using the courts to try to collect board bills is ill…
Some counties in Missouri don't charge board bills. Those include聽the most urban counties in the state: both the city and county of 狐狸视频,…
I did my time and then some. This is how they get people. They keep them on probation and then if they don't pay their board bill they violate…
By 2009, Rapp was behind in her payments and the court revoked her probation. She did a couple of days in jail and her cash bond of $400 was a…
Every week in Missouri, a judge somewhere holds a crowded docket to collect room and board from people who were recently in jail. The judges c…
鈥淚 don鈥檛 see why he has to keep going to court every month,鈥 she says. Sharon uses her Social Security income to try to keep him out of jail. …
Because Precious Jones was late to jail, prosecutor and judge seek to add to her sentence.
The Missouri Supreme Court and Missouri Legislature should revisit their 2015 and 2016 efforts to reform courts. More work is necessary.
Other than now being required to meet federal standards for that drug testing, private probation companies face nearly no oversight in Missour…
鈥淚 messed up on probation,鈥 he says. 鈥淚t was my fault.鈥 Still, he doesn鈥檛 think it makes sense that he鈥檚 still hauled to court once a month wi…
Murr owed Dent County about $4,000 for her 鈥渂oard bill鈥 for the 95 days she had been jailed.
The domestic violence victim, Gaddis says, wouldn鈥檛 make a report to police because she feared going to jail herself and losing her child.聽
鈥淭hey make you jump through hoops,鈥 Bote says, 鈥渁nd then they keep moving the hoops higher.鈥
William Everts stole from a church. Almost immediately, he knew it was a bad idea.
Bergen has the sort of back story that would inspire one of the movies or television episodes based in the Ozarks that seem to be all the rage…
Clark ended up spending 495 days in county jail awaiting a trial that still hasn鈥檛 come.
Pritchett first called me last year, after I wrote about a St. Francois County woman who was sent to prison for failing to pay court costs. He…
Rob Hopple had been in jail since May after falling behind on payments on an ankle bracelet. Court dates kept coming and going, with the prose…
The bills are that high because the two criminal defendants couldn鈥檛 afford to pay for an initial sentence behind bars for relatively minor of…
鈥淭he practical reality is that people are being arrested for being poor,鈥 Mueller says. 鈥淎nd there鈥檚 nothing they can do about it. They just s…
At least twice in recent years, the Missouri Supreme Court has overturned harsh sentences issued by a judge after she sent people to prison so…
Branson, in early 2018, was in Desloge, Mo., now, living with her 15-year-old son, checking in with her parole officer, hoping never to go bac…
Officially, Victoria Branson鈥檚 probation was revoked because she never paid the state the past due support and the court costs, which rang up …