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State Citation Description/Statute Name Question Brief answer Language from the opinion When does the case apply?
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Arkansas Opinion No. 96-208 Imprisonment for failure to pay - double jeopardy Other applicable opinions
No, it does not constitute double jeopardy to imprison a person for failure to pay a fine when the person has already had his probation revoked, and has served a
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term of imprisonment, for failing to satisfy, as a condition of his probation, his obligation to pay the fine -- if the person is not indigent.
"such a course of action is authorized by law and does not violate U.S. Const. amend. 5 or Ark. Const. art. 2,
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§ 8, the constitutional provisionsprohibiting the placing of a person in jeopardy more than once for the same offense."
Enforcement
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Arkansas Opinion No. 2008-153 district court discretion to refuse probation sentence
Q2) Does a circuit or district court have discretion to refuse to sentence a defendant to probation pursuant to a plea agreement where the only stated reason for rejection of
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probation is due to an indigent defendant's inability to pay court costs prior to the entry of the plea of guilty? Answer) No
I believe a court's refusal to consider probation as a sentencing option purely because of a defendant's indigency -- which is what your question appears to contemplate -- might well
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be subject to challenge as a violation of the Equal Protection guarantees set forth in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and in article 2, §§ 2 and 3 of the Arkansas Constitution.
Ability to pay
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Utah Normal G. Angus, Informal Opinion No. 87-06, 1987 WL 272559, at *2-3 (July 15, 1987) Informal Opinion No. 87-06
Are the same procedural protections that are required in criminal proceedings required in civil collection/contempt proceedings arising from criminal justice debt when those proceedings may result in incarceration? What if
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the proceedings may only result in additional fines or non-incarceration penalties?
Unclear. Bail forfeiture proceedings do not provide the same safeguards. I am unsure if this can be extrapolated to collection proceedings.
Bail forfeiture actions are civil in nature; criminal procedure safeguards are not implicated….In comparing the two approaches to nonappearance—bail forfeiture versus contempt—it becomes readily apparent that the contempt process presents
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fewer obstacles of statutory construction and would be procedurally easier to effectuate.
Enforcement
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Utah Ms. Faye Price, Informal Opinion No. 79-51, 1979 WL 32606, at *1 (Feb. 15, 1979) Informal Opinion No. 79-51, Does allowing different municipalities to set their own indigence standards or fines/fees violate the equal protection afforded by the state’s constitution?
Possibly. Ability to pay should be consistently applied in reference to statute that requires parents and guardians to pay for the cost and maintenance of State Training School residents. Therefore,
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it is possible that determining ability to pay when assessing criminal justice debt presents same constitutional issues.
there could be constitutional difficulties arise from the manner in which it is applied if great care is not taken to insure that the determination of financial responsibility is made
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on a strictly consistent and rational basis.
Ability to pay
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Utah Ronald W. Thompson, Informal Opinion No. 77-150, 1978 WL 25972, at *1 (Feb. 7, 1978) Informal Opinion No. 77-150 see above see above
There is no requirement in the statute that there be a judicial determination of indigence, and it does not appear that a county could properly limit its payments to persons
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who have been judicially determined indigent.
Ability to pay