Credit: BlackMattersUS.com
A newly expanded federal lawsuit seeks class-action status for thousands of Oklahoma residents it says are being extorted by a collections company working for most of the state’s sheriffs and courts.
If successful, the suit could impose sweeping changes on how the state – which ranks No. 1 in locking up women and No. 2 in locking up men – operates and pays for its justice system.
An investigation in September by Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting and The Frontier, an Oklahoma-based news site, examined the state’s high female incarceration rate.
The federal lawsuit over court debt-collection practices, originally filed late last year in the Northern District of Oklahoma, took on new importance last week when attorneys filed a motion for class-action status and two prominent legal groups joined the case.
The suit names sheriffs in 54 counties, judges and court officials along with Oklahoma-based Aberdeen Enterprizes II. The private, for-profit company contracts with the sheriffs to collect unpaid court fines and fees owed by people charged with traffic offenses, misdemeanors and felonies.
The suit claims that the company orders […]
Our court system has nothing to do with justice, it is a business – this is a fact. Do some deep research.