Messenger movingly profiles three single mothers who share their jailhouse ordeals of being abused by “a judicial process that often serves as a backdoor tax collection system.” Convicted of a misdemeanor shoplifting charge for stealing a tube of mascara, Brooke Bergen went to jail for a year and struggled with a minor parole violation that induced a hefty fine she struggles to pay off. Seeking to counterbalance revenue shortcomings and underfunding, counties depend on court-generated fees, regardless of whether defendants can afford them or not. In many areas, the author notes, municipal budgets are tight. The author scrutinizes the tragic ways judicial systems keep poor citizens in a cycle of jail sentences via overwhelming financial burdens placed on them, from the time of arrest and even after their sentence is served. Louis Post-Dispatch, Messenger exposes the widening divide between lawful fairness and the poverty-stricken population in rural Missouri communities. A Pulitzer Prize–winning columnist reports on how the American justice system has fallen critically out of balance.Įxpanding on his series of columns for the St.

Tony messenger profit and punishment