Courts use agencies to collect $42 million in unpaid fees

$42 million in unpaid court costs

Montgomery County hires agencies to collect court fees

Man, 68, drowns at Caesar Creek Lake
5/26/12
Water rescues prompt warning from health officials
5/25/12
Beach Waterpark sued for failure to deliver
5/25/12
Raleigh Trammell’s defense opens in felony trial
5/25/12
UD to move satellite campus to Dublin
5/25/12
> More headlines

By Amelia Robinson, Staff Writer Updated 11:31 PM Thursday, January 20, 2011

DAYTON — Montgomery County Clerk of Courts Gregory Brush says his office owes it to citizens to collect some of the $42 million in unpaid court costs that have accumulated during the past 10 years.

But not all will be pleased. “Over the next couple of months, some people won’t be happy with me,” Brush said.

The process began this month when two Ohio-based debt collection agencies began sending letters to people with outstanding fees for criminal or civil cases, Brush said. He did not know Wednesday the total number of people who owe the county or who owes the most.

Brush’s office collected about $1.9 million in court costs in 2010 and $2.6 million the previous year. “That’s not even half of what people owe,” said Brush, noting that about $40 million of the delinquent fees are for criminal cases.

It is difficult to get payments for such cases, Miami County Clerk of Court Jan Mottinger said.

“Most of them are indigent,” he said.

But there are signs that such collection agreements can be successful.

Ohio’s municipal courts first started using debt-collection agencies in 2002, said Dayton Clerk of Court Mark Owens. A recent change in the law allows the fees for the collection agencies’ service — about 33 percent in Dayton — to be charged to the person who owes the court cost.

Owens said his office’s program brings in about $600,000 in unpaid court costs and fees for traffic and other cases annually. The collection agency receives about $200,000 from the debtors, he said.

“That’s probably the real tough stuff that wouldn’t have been collected,” he said.

In 1997, Greene County Clerk Terri A. Mazur’s Office became one of the first in the state to collect court costs from inmates. Since then, it has brought in $600,000.

Like Mottinger, Mazur said using a collection agency is impractical for the volume of cases her office handles. “We don’t have the same collection issues (as a larger court),” she said.

Share this article