PANEL'S DECISON JEOPARDIZES LAW ENFORCEMENT FUND; CRIME REDUCTION FUNDS AT STAKE

A decision by a state commission has halted the practice of requiring criminals to pay money into a county law enforcement fund as a condition of probation.

The Commission on Retirement, Removal and Discipline of Judges last month advised judges against requiring defendants to pay money into county crime reduction funds. The commission said there was no state law or constitutional provision allowing for payments.

"The judge should not impose, as a condition of probation, payments to the county treasury, a county crime reduction fund or specified charity absent a state statute or constitutional provision authorizing such payments," the commission said in its ruling.

Commissioners said the state Constitution provides that "all penalties, forfeitures and fines collected" for violations of the state's penal laws be distributed annually to the local school districts.

The commission said any plan that diverted money from schools to charities or other funds specified by municipal or county ordinance violates the judicial code of conduct.

The commission said it "creates an appearance of impropriety and indicates the judge has not been faithful to the law."

The ruling jeopardizes one source of funding for local law enforcement in Missouri counties, officials in Cape Girardeau and Bollinger counties said Friday. In Cape Girardeau County, the fund generates about $100,000 a year. Payments to the special law enforcement fund in Bollinger County totaled about $13,000 last year.

The money goes to equipment for local law enforcement agencies, such as bullet-proof vests. The loss of the fund is a major blow to financially strapped rural counties like Bollinger County, officials said.

While the commission's Sept. 3 ruling technically is advisory, judges aren't likely to go against a board that has the power to discipline them, Cape Girardeau County Prosecuting Attorney Morley Swingle said.

Judges in Cape Girardeau and Bollinger counties no longer will order convicted criminals to pay into the special fund.

Cape Girardeau and Bollinger County officials hope lawmakers will pass legislation in the 1999 session to re-establish the crime reduction fund system and put it on solid legal ground.

Bollinger County Prosecuting Attorney Bill Hopkins is circulating a petition asking lawmakers to allow counties to have local control of fines imposed on criminals.

Cape Girardeau County Sheriff John Jordan said he expects the sheriffs and prosecutors associations and the Missouri Association of Counties to lobby for legislation to restore the funding system.

Swingle said the funding is vital to many local law enforcement agencies in the state that operate on meager budgets.

"Secondly, it gives a feeling of satisfaction that criminals are helping pay for the operation of law enforcement agencies that are catching them," he said.

Swingle said counties started setting up special law enforcement funds in 1988 on the basis of a Missouri attorney general's opinion.

Swingle said there wasn't any law on the books that specifically allowed such funds or prohibited such funds.

Hopkins said Bollinger County was the second county in the state to establish such a fund.

The Cape Girardeau County Commission established a crime reduction fund in October 1988. It is run by a board of trustees composed of the presiding commissioner, the sheriff and the recorder of deeds.

Jordan said the fund has helped make the sheriff's department the best equipped in the region.

Money from the fund also has been distributed to the Cape Girardeau and Jackson police departments.

In Bollinger County, the county commission must authorize any expenditure of money from the fund.

Hopkins said that when he served as associate circuit judge, he regularly required convicted criminals to pay money into the fund in lieu of fines. Hopkins said it makes sense to require criminals to pay into a fund to help pay the costs incurred by local governments in fighting crime.

Jordan agreed. "The public loves the idea that the criminal pays," he said.

Swingle said there aren't any uniform procedures in place regarding the management of special law enforcement funds. He said such funds shouldn't be used as a way to allow criminals to receive more lenient sentences in exchange for payments to those county funds.

Constitutional concerns over whether the monetary payments must go to the school districts could pose a problem to any legislative efforts to restore the funding, Swingle said.