The Akron Legal News

Bill would give trial courts authority to clear their uncollectible debt

TIFFANY L. PARKS
Special to the Legal News
Published: June 22, 2011

A bill that would amend state law on uncollectible amounts due to trial courts is moving through the Ohio House.

House Bill 247, sponsored by Rep. James Butler, would permit a court to cancel claims for uncollectible debt.

“If at any time, more than five years from the date that an amount owing to the court was due, the court finds that the amount is uncollectible, in whole or in part, the court may direct the clerk of the court to cancel all or part of the claim,” the proposed legislation reads.

The court’s clerk would then put the cancellation in effect.

In sponsor testimony for HB 247 before the House Judiciary and Ethics committee this week, Butler, R-Dayton, said trial courts are in need of the right to dispose of uncollectible debt.

“The bill gives a court the authority to find, after five years, that an amount due is uncollectible,” he said. “This change will give courts the ability to clear these unpaid and uncollectible debts off their books.”

Under current law, Butler said, such uncollectible debt remains on the record indefinitely.

HB 247 also would authorize a sentencing court to waive, suspend or modify payment of the costs of prosecution and it looks to define a “case” in connection with the imposition of costs in a criminal trial.

The proposed legislation also aims to abolish the Felony Sentence Appeal Cost Oversight Committee.

Butler said the provision to permit trial courts the authority to suspend the imposition or payment of costs after the court has imposed a sentence is based upon the Ohio Supreme Court’s decision in State v. Clevenger, 114 Ohio St.3d 258 (2007).

“In Clevenger, the Supreme Court found that a trial court does not have the authority to either suspend the imposition or payment of court costs after the court has imposed sentence, even when the offender is indigent,” he said, adding that the court’s decision was based upon a “lack of specific statutory authority.”

Butler said HB 247 is intended to offer the court such a specific authority to waive court costs at sentencing or at any time following the sentencing.

The proposal states “the court retains jurisdiction to waive, suspend, or modify the payment of the costs of prosecution, including any costs under (state law) at the time of sentencing or at any time thereafter.”

Under the bill, Butler said, court costs would be assessed on each case, not each count, in an indictment.

“There are some courts in Ohio that are assessing court costs on each count of an indictment as opposed to assessing those costs on one case,” he said.

The lawmaker then pointed to Middleburg Heights v. Quinones, 120 Ohio St.3d 534, in which the Supreme Court found that the law does not specifically authorize imposition of these costs for each offense committed.

Butler said HB 247 seeks to clarify that when courts impose costs on a case it means a prosecution arising from an act regardless of the number of offenses.

The initiative defines a case as “prosecution of all the charges that result from the same act, transaction, or series of acts or transactions and that are given the same case type designator and case number.”

Butler said the bill does not address the portion of the court’s decision dealing with the imposition of multiple fees being assessed in one case.

In regard to deleting the language in current law related to the Felony Sentence Appeal Cost Oversight Committee, Butler said the eight-member committee met only once in its history.

“The committee determined that the new appeals could be managed without added costs and returned funding to the General Assembly,” he said. “It has not met in the intervening 15 years.”

State law says the state criminal sentencing commission shall periodically provide to the committee all data the commission collects pursuant to division (A)(5) of section 181.25 of the Revised Code.

Upon receipt of such data, the committee is charged with reviewing the material and determining whether any money has been appropriated to the judiciary budget administered by the Supreme Court specifically for the purpose of providing state financial assistance to counties.

The law goes on to say that if the committee determines that any money has been so appropriated, it must develop a recommended method of distributing the funds to the counties.

Butler said the proposed bill has been backed by the Supreme Court and the Ohio Judicial Conference.

HB 247 has been co-sponsored by Rep. Richard Adams, R-Troy, Rep. Peter Beck, R-Mason, Rep. Cheryl Grossman, R-Grove City, Rep. Michael Henne, R-Clayton, Rep. Matt Huffman, R-Lima, Rep. Tom Letson, D-Warren, Rep. Dennis Murray, D-Sandusky, and Rep. Gerald Stebelton, R-Lancaster.

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