Tracking Court Cost Waivers

Earlier this year National Public Radio ran a series on court costs entitled Guilty and Charged. The general point of the series was that “the costs of the criminal justice system in the United States are paid increasingly by the defendants and offenders”—a population that is mostly poor. Missed payments often lead to more fees, interest, probation violations, and eventually incarceration. North Carolina is no exception to the national trend. In fact, court costs have been a particular area of legislative focus here over the past half-decade. As I described in a prior post, G.S. 7A-304 was amended in 2011 so that costs apply by default even in active punishment cases (previously, no costs were assessed in active cases unless the judge specifically said so), and to require a judge to make a written finding of “just cause” before waiving costs. S.L. 2011-145. In 2012 the law was changed again to require “findings of fact and conclusions of law” in support of that finding. S.L. 2012-142. Since 2011, the Administrative Office of the Courts has been required to maintain a record of all cases in which criminal costs are waived. That record was the subject of a recent article in North Carolina Lawyers Weekly entitled “A Costly Business”, written by Phillip Bantz and available here for subscribers. The report showed that waiver rates vary a lot from county to county, with Robeson and Wake showing “the most dramatic discrepancy.” Robeson judges waived costs 4,284 times between July 2012 and June 2013. [...]