mandatory minimum sentences – Missouri House of Representatives Newsroom

House bill to end modern ‘debtors’ prisons’ in Missouri signed into law

A House bill that became law Tuesday aims to keep Missourians from being jailed for failing to pay the costs of being jailed.

Representative Bruce DeGroot (center, standing) watches as Governor Mike Parson signs a bill he sponsored, House Bill 192, into law. (photo; Ben Peters, Missouri House Communications)

House Bill 192, targeting so-called “debtors prisons” in Missouri, was signed into law by Governor Mike Parson (R). It will do away with “show cause” hearings, in which defendants must provide a reason for failing to pay “board bills” for time they spent in a county jail. Failure to show cause often resulted in additional jail time and additional board bills that could add up to thousands of dollars.

HB 192 will let counties use civil means to collect jail debts, but they can no longer threaten additional jail time for failure to pay.

“[Courts] can still charge people for the time they spend in jail. [They] can’t have show cause hearings anymore. [Courts] can’t put people back in jail for not paying their jail bill,” said bill sponsor Representative Bruce DeGroot (R-Chesterfield). “[Counties] can still sue that person civilly and reduce that debt to a judgment and garnish wages just like you would in a civil court with a credit card debt or a medical bill.”

DeGroot worked closely with Kansas City representative Mark Ellebracht (D) on the legislation.

“I think it means a lot in terms of just fairness and justice and how the system works,” said Ellebracht, “because once a person gets put in jail, once they get sent down for 30 days, their time is their punishment. That’s the deal that we’ve made with people: we’re going to sentence you to 30 days … now with regard to what you owe the sheriff for their bill … you can’t pay that bill off if you’re in jail on a warrant for not paying that bill, so it just makes sense that the sheriff should have to collect that money through the normal debt collection processes like any other creditor would have to.”

DeGroot and Ellebracht both credit St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist Tony Messenger for spurring the legislation with a series of articles he wrote about the current system. Those articles also earned Messenger a Pulitzer Prize.

In one case Messenger wrote about, a woman incurred more than $10,000 in “board bills” after stealing an $8 tube of mascara.

DeGroot said situations like that go against the principle of people who have paid their debt to society returning to being productive members of society, providing for themselves and their families, and getting back on the tax rolls.

“A bill like this, in my opinion, is win-win. Yes, it helps the people that would otherwise be burdened with these jail bills, but it also helps our entire society as a whole,” said DeGroot.

Representative Mark Ellebracht worked across the political aisle with Rep. DeGroot to end what many called modern ‘debtors prisons’ in Missouri. (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

In presenting HB 192 DeGroot was the most visibly animated and joyful he has been in his three years in the legislature. He admits he was very enthused about the legislation.

“The reason I went to law school was I loved the book To Kill A Mockingbird … and I wanted to be Atticus Finch. I wanted to change the world, and after you graduate from law school you’ve got student debt, you have houses, and kids, and cars, and who knows what, trips to Disneyworld, and you forget about being Atticus Finch. Well now my kids are grown, and you don’t have quite the pressures you used to, and I view [House Bill 192] as probably the best thing I ever did with my law degree.”

Following their success with HB 192, Ellebracht said he and DeGroot are talking regularly about other topics they hope to team up on.

Ellebracht says any differences he and DeGroot have in party or other issues don’t really have any bearing on criminal justice reform, “When we’re looking at something and we’re saying to ourselves, ‘[Missouri law is] really handicapping a lot of folks in the economy by preventing them from getting good jobs, and [Missouri law is] really handicapping a lot of businesses by putting them in a position where they can’t afford to be hiring folks who have had that little minor scrape in their background, for fear of some kind of public retribution, or maybe a lawsuit here or there or something like that, so we need to figure out a way that we can adjust the way we do things so that it’s more fair for everybody involved.”

HB 192 also included language that would allow judges to waive mandatory minimum sentencing requirements for non-violent offenders who meet certain criteria.

Both provisions become effective August 28.

Earlier stories:

Legislature proposes reforms to end ‘debtor’s prisons,’ mandatory minimum sentences

House votes to prevent of jailing of Missourians for failing to pay jail bills

House bill to relax mandatory minimum sentencing signed into law

Judges will be able to ignore Missouri’s mandatory minimum sentencing requirements in some cases, under a House Bill that was signed into law this week by Governor Mike Parson (R).

Representative Cody Smith (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Missouri law requires that offenders with one prior conviction serve at least 40-percent of a prison term. Those with two prior convictions must serve at least half their term, and those with three or more must serve 80-percent.

House Bill 192 contained language that would give judges flexibility in sentencing for some nonviolent offenses. It was part of a broader look at criminal justice reform that House members have been pursuing over several sessions.

The language was proposed by Representative Cody Smith (R-Carthage).

“When Governor Parson signed House Bill 192 that was the most significant mandatory minimum sentencing reform, to my knowledge, that we’ve ever had in Missouri,” said Smith. “That’s an incredibly rewarding feeling when we know that it’s become clear that harsh mandatory minimum sentencing for non-violent crimes only leads to bad outcomes, and this is a way that we can start to help change the trajectory of people’s lives.”

Smith said the number of people in Missouri’s prisons has steadily grown for decades. He said many of those being incarcerated are non-violent offenders, who have a high rate of recidivism and of committing increasingly violent offenses.

“I’ve heard it said that prison is finishing school for hardened criminals,” said Smith. “You go in for something that may be relatively innocuous in terms of violence … you come out and you’re a hardened criminal.”

Smith, who is also the chairman of the House Budget Committee, said reducing Missouri’s prison populations would also save the state money. He notes that as recently as 2017, Missouri was on track to need two new prisons to accommodate the growing number of offenders.

“I believe that the mandatory minimum reform language that’s in House Bill 192 will help deter those costs by keeping people out of prison – again we’re talking only about folks convicted of non-violent crimes – keeping them out of prison is better for them, better for their families, better for society, and also better for taxpayers who don’t have to pay to keep them in prison.”

Ballwin representative Shamed Dogan (R) chairs the House Special Committee on Criminal Justice, which handled not only HB 192, but Smith’s original legislation, House Bill 113. He said the mandatory minimum sentencing changes will allow judges those cases to be judges.

“That is something that will give people more second chances – people who shouldn’t be in prison as long as that mandatory sentence would determine,” said Dogan. “A judge can look at that person’s overall life; they can look at the particulars of their offense, and really just letting judges do their job, which is to make tough decisions without having their hands tied behind their backs by mandatory minimum sentences.”

Other language in HB 192 will keep counties from putting an individual back in jail for failing to pay the cost of his or her earlier jail term.

The bill’s provisions take effect August 28.

Legislature proposes reforms to end ‘debtor’s prisons,’ mandatory minimum sentences

The Legislature has approved bipartisan legislation that would keep Missourians from being put back in jail for failing to pay the costs of being put in jail; and would eliminate mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent crimes.

Representative Bruce DeGroot (photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

House Bill 192 aims to end charging prisoners board bills” for their stays in jail. Persons who don’t pay those bills can be required to come to a “show-cause” hearing and risk additional jail time. Lawmakers said this amounted to putting people in a “debtor’s prison.”

The bill would allow counties to seek to collect jail bills through civil means, with no threat of jail time. The House’s 138-11 vote on Monday sends that bill to Governor Mike Parson (R).

Bill sponsor Bruce DeGroot (R-Chesterfield) worked closely with Liberty Democrat Mark Ellebracht on the legislation. DeGroot said current law is putting Missourians who’ve committed minor crimes and who can’t afford to pay fines and boarding costs back in jail, where they only incur more boarding costs.

“The people who don’t pay their fines and court costs who got put in jail because they couldn’t afford to bond themselves out, and now all of a sudden they owe $1300 for their week in jail and fines and court costs, and then they come before the judge and the judge says, ‘You owe $1300,’ and they say, ‘I don’t have it,’ and he says, ‘Fine, come on back next month and have at least $100,’ so they come on back the next month and they don’t have it and the judge puts them in jail, or they don’t show because they can’t get a babysitter or they can’t get off work, or they do get off work and they get fired,” said DeGroot.

DeGroot said in one case, a woman who stole an $8 tube of mascara incurred more than $10,000 in “board bills.”

Representative Mark Ellebracht (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

Ellebracht said the legislation is proof that opposing parties who often vehemently disagree can come together to do good things.

“We worked well together on this issue because we worked as colleagues and we respected each other’s opinion, and we made what I regard as a very, very good bill, and we are correcting a problem that a lot of people face in the State of Missouri,” said Ellebracht.

The Senate added to HB 192 legislation to allow judges to waive mandatory minimum sentencing requirements for non-violent offenders who meet certain criteria. That was the goal of House Bill 113, which the House passed in February, 140-17.

It was sponsored by Carthage Republican Cody Smith.

“It’s been shown in other red states like Texas and Oklahoma that if we change the way we treat folks – non-violent offenders – we can lead to better outcomes by keeping them out of prison, to the extent that that’s possible. It leads to better outcomes in their lives, their families’ lives. It leads to savings by not having people incarcerated in state prisons,” said Smith.

Springfield Republican Curtis Trent said both provisions speak to priorities that Governor Parson and Chief Justice Zel Fischer both spoke about when addressing the House and the Senate earlier this year.

“It’s a question of who we want in our prisons. Do we want people in our prisons who are mainly a threat to themselves – they have poor judgement – or do we want people in there who are truly a threat to society, who are predators, who are going to victimize other people, not just for minor, monetary amounts, but in ways that are truly life-altering, and I think those are the people who we want to prioritize,” said Trent.

It’s now up to Governor Parson whether HB 192 becomes law. If it does, it would take effect August 28.

Missouri House endorses elimination of mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent crimes

The Missouri House has voted to eliminate mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent crimes.

Missouri law requires that offenders with one prior conviction must serve at least 40-percent of a prison term. Those with two prior convictions must serve 50-percent, and those with three or more must serve 80-percent.

House Bill 113 would allow judges to make exceptions to those mandates if, based on certain criteria, those minimums would be unjust to the defendant or unnecessary to protect the public.

“This enables us to, as someone said, differentiate between the folks that we’re scared of and the folks that we’re mad at,” said bill sponsor Cody Smith (R-Carthage).

Supporters say reforms such as those in HB 113 would keep individuals who made bad decisions but aren’t likely to commit further offenses from spending too much time in prison, where they might learn to commit additional and more violent offenses.

Projections say HB 113 will also save the state more than $3-million by 2023, by leading to the release of an estimated 466 prisoners and thereby eliminating the cost of housing, feeding, and otherwise seeing to the needs of those individuals.

Smith notes that those projections don’t include the fact that as recently as last year, Missouri was seen as on pace to need another two prisons in the next five years.

“Not having to build new prisons and incarcerate more and more folks, and house them, having that cost of operational cost … we’re talking about hundreds of millions of dollars,” said Smith.

The bill drew broad bipartisan support, passing out of the House 140-17. St. Louis Democrat Steven Roberts said while the bill removes minimum sentences, it doesn’t stop a judge from imposing maximum sentences when appropriate.

Representative Brandon Ellington (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

“I just want to emphasize the point that what this bill does is it doesn’t lower the ceiling, so if there’s an egregious offense – if something heinous happens, there’s nothing in this bill that lowers the ceiling of discretion, but what it does is it lowers the floor,” said Roberts.

Democrats called the bill a good step in the direction of criminal justice reform, but say they hope to see more.

Kansas City representative Brandon Ellington (D) has filed legislation that would further change the laws regarding minimum sentences, and named other reforms his party supports.

“Expungement is still a hot topic; some of the laws around marijuana expungement, etcetera – not just for the medicinal but full-scale expungement, so we’re looking at things of that nature,” said Ellington.

HB 113 now goes to the Senate, where last year’s version of the same legislation was referred to a committee but did not receive a hearing.

Missouri House votes to give judges more freedom from mandatory minimum sentences

The Missouri House has voted to give judges more flexibility in sentencing by easing Missouri’s mandatory minimum sentencing laws.

Representative Cody Smith (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

House Bill 1739 would allow judges to issue sentences below those minimums except in crimes that involved the use, attempted use, or threat of physical force, or certain non-consensual sex crimes against a minor. A case would have to have a “substantial and compelling” reason the minimum sentence would be unjust to the defendant or would not be needed to protect the public. The House voted Tuesday to send that legislation to the state Senate.

Carthage Representative Cody Smith (R) sponsors the bill. He said Missouri is on course to need two new prisons that would cost the state more than $485-million over the next five years.

“We don’t have the money to build those prisons and there’s no end in sight to this trend. If we don’t change the way we treat folks – better distinguish those that we’re mad as opposed to those we’re afraid of, as they say, we’re just going to continue on this trajectory and our incarceration rate is going to continue to climb,” said Smith.

Meanwhile, Smith said, other states where mandatory minimum sentencing laws have been eased have seen crime rates decline rather than increase.

He said nothing about HB 1739, which he calls the “Justice Safety Valve Act,” prevents a judge from handing down a sentence that follows those minimum sentencing laws.

“If it’s a bad guy in front of the court and the judge wants to throw the book at him, he can absolutely do that,” said Smith.

Representative Bruce Franks, Junior (photo; Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications – click for larger version)

Support for Smith’s bill came from both sides of the aisle, with several lawmakers including Representative Bruce Franks, Junior, (D-St. Louis) saying it is a reversal on what they called a “failed” war on drugs.

“We are finally getting to a space where we can have this bipartisan effort and this bipartisan push towards criminal justice reform; towards keeping folks out of the system that can be rehabilitated and need the help,” said Franks.

Pacific Republican Paul Curtman argued there should be no minimum sentences for any nonviolent crime.

“I think that we need to make sure that we let judges be judges, and that involves us respecting the separation of powers and letting judges look at each case-by-case scenario. Somebody carrying a block of heroin down the street might be entirely different from the next person who comes along and the reasons they were carrying a block of heroin down the street,” said Curtman.

Legislative projections are that HB 1739 would save the state more than $3-million a year by the time it is fully implemented in Fiscal Year 2023, by decreasing the number of people incarcerated in state prisons. That does not account for what the state would save if it does not have to build and maintain those two new prisons.

The House voted 148-0 to send the proposal to the state Senate.

Representative proposes easing of mandatory minimums for some crimes

The state House is being asked to consider giving judges more flexibility about when to impose minimum sentences mandated by Missouri law for many offenses.

House Bill 1739 would allow judges to depart from those mandatory minimums except regarding crimes that involved the use, attempted use, or threat of serious physical force, or certain non-consensual sex crimes against a minor. The case would have to involve “substantial and compelling” reasons that the minimum sentence would be unjust to the defendant, or would not be needed to protect the public.

It’s sponsored by Carthage Representative Cody Smith (R).

“HB 1739 would permit judges to adjust the length of a prison sentence to fit the crime and a person’s role in it. If someone played a very minor role in a nonviolent offense but still deserves some prison time, the judge could give the person a shorter sentence that is more appropriate for the severity of the crime,” said Smith.

Smith said one of the issues his bill would help address is overcrowding in Missouri’s prisons. It is predicted that Missouri is on pace to need to build two new prisons. The cost to the state to build and operate those is projected at $485-million over the next five years.

Many offenders in Missouri prisons are serving sentences stemming from nonviolent drug offenses. Smith said in such cases, easing mandatory minimum sentencing requirements could allow judges to instead require drug treatment and other programs in lieu of prison time. Smith said treatment outside of prison is typically more effective.

“It’s my understanding that drug treatment in prisons is largely unsuccessful and it’s much more successful outside of prisons through programs like drug courts. To have people working with drug courts or through their probation or parole while they can maintain a job, be with their family presumably, be productive citizens I think is much better than having them incarcerated and trying to do that through prison sentencing,” said Smith. “[Drug issues are] more of a health care problem at this point rather than a criminal justice issue, in my mind.”

Smith said more than 30 states have reduced, eliminated, or reformed mandatory minimum sentences and in those states crime rates have dropped. He thinks the changes to sentencing laws contributed to those drops.

“Once you have a prison sentence you lose your job, often times you lose your family, you are unable to maintain whatever positive momentum you have going in your life. I can see how you would very easily turn back to crime or drugs when you get out of prison, or do something in prison that would keep you there for a longer time,” said Smith. “If you can maintain some semblance of a normal lifestyle – again with your family, with a job, and work with something like a drug court – then you have incentive to turn your life around, and that’s been the case in those states.”

The projected fiscal impact of HB 1739 says it could save Missouri more than $3.1-million once fully implemented. Smith notes that does not include how much the state could save if it is able to avoid building and operating any new prisons.

The bill has been approved by the House Committee on Crime Prevention and Public Safety. It faces another committee, which could vote whether to send it to the full house for consideration.