anyway, if you could take a look over this, that'd be great!
Category: Civil Rights
Strength: Significant
The World Assembly,
Understanding that not all people have the same representation in the justice system,
Recognizing that differential access to resources should not be cause for incarceration-induced poverty,
Realizing that allowing the existence of a monetary factor creates a perverse incentive for any justice system,
Hereby,
1.2.
- Notes that "fines or fees" or any combination thereof in this legislation should be understood to refer to court or police mandated financial restitution, save for judgements rendered in civil court
- Notes that for the purposes of this legislation, "detention facilities" refers to jails, prisons, or any other facility where individuals are held in official custody for an extended period of time for committing or allegedly committing an action prohibited by law
3.
- Prohibits the sole determinant in one's eligibility for pre-trial detention to be an ability or inability to pay or have a third party pay a fine, fee, court debt, or bail cost
- Clarifies that the above does not prohibit economic status from being used as a factor in assessing pre-trial detention status
- Recommends that nations adapt their schema for assessing pre-trial detention status to one based on public safety and/or flight risk
- Recommends that nations or subnational jurisdictions adopt universal bail guidelines so as to impose a uniform and fair pre-trial detention framework
- Recommends that nations adopt Unsecured Bonds as a substitute in order to mitigate the fiscal impact upon their justice systems
4.
- Prohibits member states from suspending, confiscating, or invalidating a driver's license, bus pass, train pass, or equivalent documentation allowing an individual the ability to use transportation for unpaid fines, fees, or court debt
- Clarifies that the above clause does not apply to international transit
- Retroactively reinstates the documentation mentioned in Clause 3a, so long as the suspension was solely for non-payment
- Prohibits the arrest or detention of individuals for inability to afford a ticket for a traffic violation
- Prohibits the suspension, confiscation, or invalidation of a work permit for unpaid fines, fees, or court debt
- Prohibits the issuing of arrest warrants over unpaid court debt as long as other methods of collection are possible
- Prohibits courts from issuing fines and fees to minors who are not legally permitted to work
- Clarifies that the above clause does not prohibit fines or fees from being issued to the legal guardians of said minors in their stead
- Prohibits any law enforcement agency, court, or other agent of the state from setting interest that exceeds the projected inflation rate in the most relevant administrative jurisdiction on fines, fees, or outstanding court debt
- Prohibits mandatory surcharges on convictions or court procedures
5.
- Requires that courts make public in a timely manner their reasoning for remanding an individual to pre-trial detention.
- Requires that, in cases where financial bail is set, that the court take into account the ability of the defendant to pay said bail.
- Prohibits courts from setting bail costs based upon arbitrary factors that do not pose a risk to public safety or flight risk
- Prohibits officers of a court from having their salary be based upon the number of individuals they detain
- Strongly recommends that officers of a court not derive their salary from the revenues extracted from the fines or fees imposed upon individuals who pass through the legal system
- Requires that, in the case of prison labour, incarcerated or detained people be paid no less than the legally mandated minimum wage in the administrative division where their facility is located, in the currency of the nation where they reside
- If detainees are the only substantial population in their administrative jurisdiction, they shall be paid the legally mandated minimum wage of the closest substantial non-incarcerated population within the nation
- Mandates that wages incurred from labour while incarcerated or detained shall not be garnished, withheld, or confiscated by any party while the detainee remains incarcerated
- Prevents detention facilities from charging detainees for their incarceration
- Requires that detention facilities take into account the median income of a detainee in their facility before setting prices for communication services, including but not limited to phone calls, letter writing, video calls, or telegrams