Hi guys,
I’m watching “American Greed” and on the show is this bank robber who was sentenced to 185 years in jail. Well, he plea bargained down to 21 years and $175,000.00 in restitution.
Naturally, nobody saw a penny of restitution.
Why do the courts bother with restitution, when it is never paid ?
Is it just because it sounds good or does it hang over the convicted’s head and have to be paid back.
How does it ever get paid, if ever ?
IANAL, but, the fact remains that he owes the money. Maybe something someday will happen, such as the inmate might inherit a fortune or maybe some judgement. THEN the restitution kicks in.
You can’t just hand wave away debt because “he’ll never pay it”. It’s still there.
I realize that but what I’m asking is-is somebody keeping track of this or does the person who was wronged have to keep an eye on the bad guy in case he does come into some money ?
nm
Does this weigh heavily over an ex-con’s ability to make a living at a job? For example, if an ex-con gets out and finds a job making, say, $10 an hour, how much of that can be seized to pay restitution? If it sucks it all down, then that would be a huge disincentive to find honest work, which would be counterproductive to rehabilitation principles. It would probably not be fun to work 40 hours a week and take home 50 cents because everything else was seized to pay 0.0001% of my restitution, meaning that it will be years, if not decades, before I can actually start build up some savings.
Is it not the case that restitution is in some way geared to the assets of the criminal? He may have owned a house worth $175,000 for example.
Your wages can be garnished to pay criminal restitution. In general the courts don’t want people to be destitute, so there are established percentage limits to garnishment.
Anyone know the answer to this? The guy who stole and chopped my car is in the middle of an 18-month sentence. Part of his plea was restitution of my $500 deductible. I have no expectation of ever seeing the money. But I do wonder, does the court track me down if he gets a real job after his sentence is complete? Do I have to file a claim myself if I somehow find out he’s working?
As an employer, more than once I’ve received a request from a government agency to turn over a fraction of an employee’s paycheck.
Example #1, Oregon Department of Revenue: The employee was allowed to keep the first $942.50 per month (after taxes) and then the DoR wanted 25% of whatever went over that amount.
Example #2, Oregon Department of Justice: The DoJ wanted 50% of the first $514 per month but then allowed the employee to keep 100% of everything above that.
Example #3, Internal Revenue Service: The employee was allowed to keep up to $1,175 (after taxes) and then the IRS wanted 100% of everything above that.
So, in all three cases, an employee who earns $1,300 per month (after taxes) would still get to keep the vast majority of that money. And if that employee decided to work an extra shift to earn, say, $60 more… then in two of the three examples the employee still gets to keep most or all of that extra $60.
FWIW, I read about a case where a criminal was ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $796,731.98 and the judge ruled that he could make payments of $500 per month. Presumably, anything he earned over $500 would be his to keep. Harvey Updyke ordered to pay nearly $800K for poisoning Toomer's Oaks
Yes, in most jurisdictions, garnishing is limited to an amount over and above a living wage. (Where I worked, in Canada, most garnishee orders the payroll department received were for outstanding child support).
In one case I recall, there was a breakin at the club building I was a member of. The 3 fellows did almost $15,000 in damages and stolen goods. The fellow who was most instrumental in organizing and running the club took it upon himself to go to each court case and request repayment… except the last guy was caught in another break-in while awaiting his trial. The prosecutor made it clear the fellow should plead guilty immediately to all outstanding charges unless he wanted to spend a very very long time in jail, so off he went to jail before the restitution request could be submitted. The club president then spent $35 of his own money to file in small claims court. Despite the other two having had $5,000 restitution orders, the judge in small claims made an order for restitution of the full $15,000 against the third culprit.
We all had the same thought - what was the point? The guy was doing life sentence on the installment plan (a year here, a few months there, and so on). He’d never have any money. Well, he got out of jail and a few weeks later was a passenger in his friend’s car when there was a serious accident. When our prez heard (small town) the guy was going to get a physiotherapy insurance award of $20,000 he rushed down to the court and got an order to hand over $15,000 of it to our club. Oh, and the other two guys eventually paid their $5,000 once they were out and employed.
The lord works in mysterious ways. Better to have that order than not.
From my dealing with ex-cons, probationers and parolees, I can see restitution is used as a “tool” of the courts.
It’s not uncommon for probationers to get restitution as a way of keeping them out of trouble, less they miss a payment they can be put inside.
In most states, restitution is equal to a civil judgement, so it’s one less thing for the victim to get. Of course anyone who has had a civil judgement knows, getting a judgement and collecting it are two different things.
However some states have a different goal, they have "funds’ whereas the criminal instead of paying the victim will pay into a general fund. This general fund then pays the victim.
Attachments are limited as another poster pointed out. I work a lot with our state aid office, and when someone is on a food stamp program that requires them to work, the state will only attach $50 of the approx $300 month they can earn.
You have to remember things like child support always take priority, so if that person had a kid, that $50 would almost certainly go to his kid.
Of course the courts and the prisons don’t want someone in jail as it’s a great cost. So what will happen if you can’t pay and someone forces the issue is you are brought into the court as a potential violation of your release or probation.
Then the court will send you back to prison IF they can prove you substantially hid your assets or willfully failed to comply. If you honestly can’t pay the judge will then just readjust the amount you can pay and that is that.
But if you hid assets or simply refuse to pay, the judge will probably put you back inside.
This said, I’ve seen things where the judge has changed the conditions of the judgement into a civil judgement which may or may not be dischargeable in bankruptcy. I’ve seen them reduce judgements as well.
The judges in most areas do have a lot of options and a persons past record as well as current behavior will influence the outcome, at least in the cases I’ve seen in the last twenty years.
The US, in general, gives very little concern to a criminal’s ability to re-enter society.
Are you able to recover added costs that you experience? If you are doing an extra 30 minutes of paperwork/bookkeeping each pay period who pays for your time? And is it truly a “request” or is it a demand?
Some of the notices said I, the employer, was permitted to tack on an extra dollar or two administrative fee, at the end when everything else was paid. But I figured it wasn’t worth the hassle of telling my employee “Hey, sorry the [insert name of gov’t agency here] took some of your paycheck, and by the way I’m also gonna take a few more bucks for myself”… so I decided to just let it go. I already spend 60-90 minutes each month doing payroll. This extra step just adds 5 more minutes. No biggie.
I guess “demand” would be a closer description than “request”. They certainly didn’t give me the option to say “No thanks!”. But the only one that made threats about what happens if I don’t comply was the Oregon Dept. of Revenue. The others were much more subtle about it.
I had a friend who took some money (almost $10,000) from his employer. He was sentenced to 12 weekends in jail and 5 years probation. They divided the amount he owed into 60 payments and it HAD to be paid, or he was in violation of his probation. Violating probation would have meant going to jail for up to the maximum time for his crime (grand larceny), and he still would have owed the money when he got out.
I don’t know how people who owe hundreds of thousands of dollars pay it back.
Given that he was doing weekends, he probably had a job at that point which could provide $166 per week for restitution. Restitution orders can be modified if there is a legitimate hardship and the offender has demonstrated an otherwise good-faith effort to pay it back.
I remember reading in the 60’s that some employers were in the habit of firing anyone the moment they received a garnishee order. It reduced the paperwork and was also a “fuck you” to any debt-holder who tried to burden them with the extra work (and any employee who got themselves in trouble). IIRC, creditors had to go to court once to establish the debt judgement, then again to get an order applicable to the debtor’s employer. Fire the guy, and the whole second court order was wasted.
IIRC judgements fall into the same category as orderly-payment-of-debt arrangements that some places have for bankruptees. The judge will establish the income level and the necessary amount for living, and then any garnishing cannot take beyond what’s left. Plus, some assets are immune to seizure. (IIRC, Florida for example, anyone’s primary dwelling cannot be seized, which is why OJ Simpson was living in a nice expensive mansion in Florida but was running out of money because the Goldmans were seizing whatever else they could find.)
Yes, he did have a job at the time.
At his sentencing the judge said he would like nothing more than to put him in jail, but he would rather see the restitution be paid, so he gave him weekends. In this case Tuesdays and Wednesdays, his days off.