Montgomery reaches agreement over jailing of indigent

The city of Montgomery Tuesday reached an agreement to implement new procedures to ensure indigent defendants are not jailed for failure to pay their fines.

The agreement came as the result of a lawsuits brought against the city by individuals who had been jailed for accumulating thousands of dollars of unpaid court fines and fees. The plaintiffs said they were unemployed, underemployed or unable to pay, but that the city mounted no inquiry into their ability to do so. One suit accused Montgomery of "systemic illegality ... against some of its poorest people."

That appeared to fly in the face of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Bearden v. Georgia, a 1983 case that forbade governments from imprisoning individuals for their inability to pay fines. The high court said municipalities must make inquiries into an individual's ability to pay, and develop alternative sentences for the indigent.

In addition, the individuals said they received inadequate legal representation, or none at all. Many said that on top of their outstanding debts, they were often required to pay a fee to JCS, Inc., a private company contracted to collect fines for the city.

The settlement still needs approval from a federal judge.

According to one of the complaints, Montgomery collects close to $16 million a year from fines and forfeitures from municipal court, though the proportion of that money collected from outstanding debts wasn't clear. Birmingham, Huntsville and Mobile took in between $2 million and $3 million in fees and fines, according to an initial complaint.

In a consent order filed with the U.S. Middle District court Tuesday, the city agreed to provide a 60-day review for all cases before the court, and to follow the guidance laid down in Bearden and other Supreme Court cases.

The city will use forms and documentation from defendants to determine whether an individual is indigent, defined as living at 125 percent of the federal poverty line or below. The line for an individual is $14,587 a year; for a family of three, the threshold is $24,962.

Indigent defendants will be given the option of paying $25 a month toward fines, court costs, fees and restitution, or perform community service. In the latter option, an hour of community service would be worth at least $10. Courts could give defendants eight to 24 hours of community service a month, but defendants would be allowed to request more.

In addition, the city agreed that a public defender would represent defendants.

"No defendant will be incarcerated for inability to pay any court-ordered monies, including fines, court costs or restitution," the basic premises of the agreement state.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which represented two of the individuals involved in the lawsuits, hailed the agreement as "a victory for low-income residents in Montgomery."

"This is an incredibly important first step in ensuring the end of debtors' prisons in Alabama," David Dinielli, deputy legal director for the SPLC, said in a statement. "The settlement, pending approval by a federal court, should serve as a warning to other Alabama cities and towns with similar practices that we will not rest until all low income residents are treated fairly and that people are no longer jailed simply because they cannot afford to pay."

A call to the city of Montgomery was not immediately returned Tuesday afternoon.