Road Runner: Criminal charges, steep fines can start with a simple traffic ticket

How do people get their driver’s licenses suspended?

Getting precise answers to that question proved to be a little trickier than it seemed at first to the Road Runner. It’s also an issue this column will likely return to in coming editions because the legal and financial consequences of a license suspension can snowball quickly, especially for the county’s many low-income residents.

To get to the bottom of it, the Road Runner requested a spreadsheet detailing all charges or citations filed in January in Pima County Consolidated Justice Court that went into default or otherwise resulted in mandatory license suspension. When someone doesn’t pay a fine or falls behind on payments for certain violations — largely limited to moving violations — Arizona courts contact the state’s Motor Vehicle Division, which then suspends licenses, according to the Arizona Department of Transportation and local court officials.

That first request brought back a list of roughly 420 cases, the vast majority of which involved nonpayment of fines for civil traffic violations, most fairly minor. It also included around 50 DUI-related charges that come with mandatory suspensions, most of which had likely expired by the time the data was provided in late June.

But it turns out that the most common single charge, driving without a seat belt, does not actually lead to license suspension, according to interim court administrator Micci Tilton.

That specific violation was cited in a June 26 memo from County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry intended to counter what he called the “common myth” that DUI-related offenses are the primary cause of license suspensions.

While the relative weight of nonpayment of civil traffic fines was likely overestimated in the January data referenced in the memo, the broader claim that nonpayment of those often steep civil traffic fines is the most common path to license suspension is still true, according to Tilton and additional data analysis by the Star. City Court administrator Chris Hale said that was also the case for his court.

“Numbers can fluctuate, but the fundamental issues are still the same,” Huckelberry told the Road Runner. “We’re suspending a lot of more licenses than we need to, and the consequences are much larger for poorer people than those with wealth.”

Excluding the seat-belt charge and another charge that does not appear to result in suspension from the January data, a strong majority of suspensions — 57 percent — still stemmed from nonpayment of civil traffic fines.

A county spokesman said that once county administrators receives the updated data, Huckelberry will send a revised memo to the board.

However someone gets their license suspended, not having one can open motorists up to potentially serious and costly consequences, which several officials have described as a “vicious cycle” of mounting unpaid fines, criminal charges, possible jail time, job loss and other destabilizing repercussions. Those who either knowingly or unknowingly continue driving with a suspended license put themselves at risk for the misdemeanor charge of driving with a suspended license (DSL), which results in a mandatory impoundment of vehicles.

But in Pima County, how city and county prosecutors handle that misdemeanor has taken some of the sting from the charge.

Deputy City Attorney Alan Merritt said his office “dismisses those charges outright” and has done so since October 2015. That’s because many people charged with DSL don’t appear for initial court appearances, resulting in an arrest warrant and, with some frequency, their costly booking into the county jail. There are more failure-to-appear warrants for people with DSL charges in Consolidated Justice Court — over 2,300 — than for any other charge.

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“It’s absolutely not the best use of jail time and it’s enormously expensive,” Merrit said.

Statewide in fiscal year 2014, more than a quarter of the 54,000 people cited for DSL after civil traffic issues eventually failed to appear for court hearings, according to the Arizona Supreme Court’s 2016 report “Justice for All.” That report called for making license suspension a “last resort, not a first step,” and reducing first-time DSL citations to civil matters.

The county Attorney’s Office has a different policy than the city Attorney’s Office, but with a comparable result. County attorney spokeswoman Amelia Cramer said that for first-time DSL offenders whose licenses weren’t suspended for DUI charges, the office lets them plead down to a civil charge and allows extended periods of time to get their licenses reinstated.

That arrangement has been around for a while, but Cramer said that in the last couple years her department has “made a concerted effort to do that as much as possible.”

Cramer said local officials have done much of what can be done without changes in state law.

State laws say that:

• Anyone cited with DSL — even if that charge is eventually dismissed, has their vehicle impounded.
• That DSL is a misdemeanor and judges have limited latitude when it comes to reducing fines for indigent defendants.
• And licenses are suspended for failure to pay.

Two pieces of legislation that would have made significant changes made it through the state Senate but both died in the House in March.

The James E. Rogers School of Law at the University of Arizona is exploring the possibility of a program in which law students would assist defendants with DSL charges and suspended licenses, according to clinics director Paul Bennett. Tilton’s office also recently started sending out more positive, less punitive reminders of fines or other court requirements and allowing more time to lapse before reporting those cases to MVD for suspension.

Local defense attorney Stu de Haan, who has represented a number of clients who have multiple DSL charges and sometimes stratospheric unpaid fines, said the city and county policies have helped some people avoid criminal charges. However, the high cost of traffic fines mixed with high rates of local poverty makes it easy for many residents to get overwhelmed.

“These are just things that people can’t pay,” he said, adding: “I think it’s very hard to get out of if you’re a working family, just to afford these fines and impound fees. It spirals very quickly, with a couple minor mistakes you’re out a couple thousand dollars.”

DOWN THE ROAD

Kinney Road, from Arizona 86 (Ajo Highway) to Calle Don Manuel will be closed 24/7 starting 6 a.m. Wednesday. Traffic will be rerouted to alternative routes during the closure, which is a part of the continuing Arizona 86 improvement project.