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NORTH CAROLINA POVERTY RESEARCH FUND 10 Court Fines and Fees: Criminalizing Poverty in North Carolina While being able to get to work is vital, driving grants access, mobility and flexibility in innumerable other ways. Basic everyday activities—shopping, doing laundry, chauffeuring kids, going to a doctor’s appointment, volunteering, attending church services—become far more complicated in the absence of a license. Revoking the licenses of those who can’t pay doesn’t magically compel payment nor does it make roads safer. Instead, it derails defendants and forces the courts, law enforcement and motor vehicle agencies to take time and resources away from other core functions.53 Jail time Low-income North Carolinians are sent to jail because they lack the money to pay their court debt. They are not being punished for the underlying offense; they are punished for the fact of their debt. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that a defendant cannot be incarcerated for nonpayment unless the judge, after conducting a meaningful hearing, finds that the defendant “willfully refused to pay or failed to make sufficient bona fide efforts” to acquire the resources to pay.54 However, judges routinely sidestep this constitutional rule, applying hostile, incredulous or highly subjective criteria when evaluating a defendant’s ability to pay. Judges have ordered defendants who were homeless or receiving government assistance to pay. Some judges base their decisions on the defendant’s appearance, deciding that someone who looks able-bodied or well-dressed should be able to get a job or find the money. Judges have told defendants they could pay off their fines and fees by collecting cans, quitting cigarettes or giving blood. One judge in North Carolina suggested that the defendant sell his car. Not a few judges disregard the test altogether. One of the individuals we interviewed recalled how he went to court after his hearing was rescheduled. The judge, apparently peeved that the defendant’s case had been moved to his docket, summarily ordered the defendant jailed for four days without giving him a reason or inquiring into his ability to pay. Defendants in North Carolina can be jailed for nonpayment in several ways. If the defendant is on probation, failure to pay—a probation violation—can be punished with jail time.55 Some judges will activate a defendant’s suspended sentence, imposing the full term of incarceration.56 Judges can order time in jail for defendants who “willfully” fail to pay on the theory that nonpayment is a type of contempt of court.57 Because no legal standard exists for “willfulness,” defendants who fall short of a judge’s arbitrary or excessively harsh criteria can be jailed, even if payment is not a realistic option. Lastly, defendants can be arrested if they fail to appear at a hearing or have fallen behind on payments.58 53 American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, Best Practices Guide to Reducing Suspended Drivers. 54 Bearden v. Georgia, 461 U.S. 660, 672. 55 N.C. Gen. Stat. § 15A-1344(d2). 56 James Williams interview with the North Carolina Poverty Research Fund, June 30, 2017. A public defender in an unidentified county in North Carolina reported that she advised her clients who she knew couldn’t pay to accept a plea deal with jail time, rather than a suspended sentence. Diller, Bannon, and Nagrecha, Criminal Justice Debt, 23. 57 N.C. Gen. Stat. § 15A-1364. Contempt in North Carolina has been described as “an additional ‘stick’ as part of the probation supervision process, imposing periods of incarceration on top of what a defendant is subject to through probation.” Diller, Bannon, and Nagrecha, Criminal Justice Debt, 49n131. 58 See Diller, Bannon, and Nagrecha, Criminal Justice Debt, 51n145.