Yes. Yes, they have. Annie-Rose Strasser
wrote a piece for ThinkProgress
on Ohio throwing poor people in jail for owing money, which is illegal by the
way. The ACLU revealed this in a report, which as previously mentioned is illegal.
The report called The
Outskirts of Hope shows the “debtors’ prison” system in Ohio is alive
and well, and it violates both the US and Ohio’s constitution. Some are jailed
for owing as little as a few hundred dollars, and naturally the evidence shows
that this costs the state more to pay for their jail sentence than the debt. Because we fail at logic.
The report details
several stories of several people sent to debtors’ prison. For example Jack
Dawley owed $1,500 in fines and costs to the Norwalk Municipal Court, and he
was behind in child support payments. This resulted in Ohio courts sending him
to prison in Wisconsin for 3.5 years. He is still trying to repay the fines.
Another victim, Tricia Metcalf was sent to jail every time she wasn’t able to
make her $50-a-month payments on fines for writing bad checks. Ohio also adds
to the fines when people are in jail so the victims are responsible for the
original fines and additional ones.
ThinkProgress shared
AP’s round up of the charges the ACLU levels against Ohio:
“—In the second half of last year, more than one in every five of all bookings in the Huron County jail—originating from Norwalk Municipal Court cases—involved a failure to pay fines.“In suburban Cleveland, Parma Municipal Court jailed at least 45 defendants for failure to pay fines and costs between July 15 and August 31, 2012.“During the same period, Sandusky Municipal Court jailed at least 75 people for similar charges.”
Don’t worry though
the courts have promised to look into the accusations. The ThinkProgress piece
referenced a previous piece where they discussed the return of debtors’
prisons. Reportedly, people were jailed for as small as missing a single furniture
payment. This is completely disgusting. There is absolutely no way to pay debts
when in prison. They just keep accruing. It is awful.
