Ticket torment, Georgia probation systems ensnares those too poor
to pay traffic fines Posted: 12:00 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 22, 2014, By Carrie Teegardin - The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Vera Cheeks, of Bainbridge, received
a $135 ticket for rolling through a stop sign. Going on probation gave her time
to pay, but money was so tight that she was unable to make an immediate payment
of $50. Her fiancé resorted to pawning Cheeks’ engagement ring and a Weed Eater
so she could leave the building. “It just broke my heart,” Cheeks said. MARK
WALLHEISER / Special for the AJC
Vera Cheeks was hoping for mercy when
she appeared in court for rolling through a stop sign. What she got was
probation: Georgia’s high-cost solution for people who can’t immediately pay a
traffic fine. “I’m thinking, for a
ticket – I’m on probation?” Cheeks said. “What the heck happened?”
Probation in most states is reserved
for shoplifters, drunk drivers and felons who need community supervision
instead of lock-up. In Georgia, probation handles those kinds of cases. But
probation in the Peach State has also become a massive system for collecting
money from people who can’t afford to pay off traffic tickets and other
misdemeanor fines on the day they go to court.
This unique – and often lucrative – use
of community supervision has turned Georgia into the nation’s probation
kingpin. More than 500,000 Georgians were on probation in 2013, according to a
new federal report. That’s far more in sheer numbers than any other state and
represents a probation rate that is more than quadruple the national average.
Georgia is the
national leader in probations with a probation rate of 6829 per 100,000
people. The Next is Ohio with 2802 per
100,000 people. The US average probation
rate is 1605 per 100,000 people.
An investigation of probation by The
Atlanta Journal-Constitution found that waitresses, teachers, construction
workers, mothers and children, and people who haven’t worked in months stream
into probation offices across the state trying to pay off fines that can
quickly double in cost once the probation system adds its slate of fees.
The probation officers in Georgia who
handle most of the misdemeanor cases are employees of for-profit probation
companies that state law authorizes local courts to hire. Poor Georgians on
probation often claim they are threatened with jail if they get behind on
payments, even though a U.S. Supreme Court decision doesn’t allow this kind of lock-up.
Vera Cheeks’ penalty for the stop-sign
violation was a $135 fine. Going on probation gave her time to pay, but various
fees upped the cost of her punishment to $267 over three months. Cheeks said
her probation officer in a small town in South Georgia told her she would have
to report in every week and make payments when due or face a warrant for her
arrest.
Cheeks said she was ordered to make an
immediate payment of $50, which she didn’t have. Her fiancé resorted to pawning
Cheeks’ engagement ring and a Weed Eater so she could leave the building. “It
just broke my heart,” Cheeks said. ‘A
bad rap’
Source:
Atlanta Journal
Comments
What was once
a $75 ticket in the mail has turned into almost $300 with harassment. Atlanta drivers who want to avoid these
rolling stop tickets will need to come to a complete stop at every stop sign,
day or night. Heaven forbid you go through a red light.
Atlanta is
changing. It used to be the city too busy to hate. It appears it will become
the city too cautious to move. Atlanta
metro’s failure to expand the roads and highways to meet its larger population
has kept drivers frantic to keep traffic moving. That could change. Drivers now
have the incentive to adopt centenarian driving habits. How long could those traffic jams become?
Norb Leahy,
Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader
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