The Center for Children's Justice - Pennsylvania Chapter

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Friday - December 12, 2003 

ACLU says alleged "deadbeat dads" jailed without due process 

EAGLEVILLE, Pa. (AP) - Ninety men serving time in a county prison for failing to pay child support were denied their due process rights, the American Civil Liberties Union contends. 

Thirty of the men were released from the Montgomery County Correctional Facility on Wednesday, officials said. The other 60 inmates were being interviewed by county officials and others, and they could be freed within days, said the county's president judge, S. Gerald Corso. 

Pennsylvania ACLU staff lawyer Malia Brink said that county courts throughout the state often jail such men, often referred to as deadbeat dads, for civil contempt without adequate notice or enough time for them to get lawyers.

Typically, the men meet with domestic relations officials, are declared in arrears, and are quickly brought before a judge. The judge usually finds them in contempt of a court order to pay and jails them for about six months. 

Corso has ordered a review of court procedures for all those incarcerated for failing to pay support.  Among the changes already implemented: Contempt hearings will be scheduled two weeks after enforcement conferences, and defendants will be advised throughout the process of their right to an attorney. 

The ACLU thinks everyone facing prison should have counsel, Corso said.  We do not disagree with that.  Amid similar criticism from ACLU attorneys last year in western Pennsylvania, Westmoreland County judges agreed to provide court-appointed attorneys in child support cases and Lawrence County judges freed 37 inmates jailed for nonsupport. 

The ACLU hopes that the president judges of counties throughout Pennsylvania will respond to the ACLU's request with the same dispatch and sense of justice that Montgomery County showed, Brink said in a prepared statement.

But we're realistic and realize that we may have to file suit against one or more counties who refuse the request.

Of the 90 child-support inmates, those on work-release were freed after agreeing to have the money they owe deducted from their wages. A second group was told they could leave the prison if they got jobs and agreed to return next month for hearings. The third group, which Corso called chronic offenders who have had three bench warrants issued against them in the last few years for failure to appear, will go before judges to see how their cases should proceed.

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This web site is strictly for your information about what is happening in our state; Pennsylvania.  Information and opinions on this website are NOT "legal" advice but ARE friendly advice from people who have been through the local domestic relations office and are very familiar with the crimes against humanity that office is getting away with strictly for PROFIT at the expense of fathers and their children.  Feel free to copy and repost any information on this site unless said information is credited to a web site other than Pennsylvania Family Court Reform (this website).  In this case, you must ask permission from the author, and since it's been our experience that most of the people that support our cause are good people, they most likely won't have a problem with it.  It's time to reclaim our state and our rights as Americans that are being trampled and ignored by a select portion of our state government, who's sole interest is PROFIT from federal grants for "child support" collection, at our expense... our JUDICIAL branch.