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Ferguson judge behind aggressive fines policy resigns as city's court system seized
Source: The Guardian
Ferguson judge behind aggressive fines policy resigns as city's court system seized
Jon Swaine in New York
Monday 9 March 2015 23.53 GMT
A judge in Ferguson, Missouri, who is accused of running a modern-day debtors’ prison while fixing traffic tickets for himself and owing $170,000 in unpaid taxes, resigned on Monday as state authorities seized control of the city’s court system.
Ronald J Brockmeyer stepped down as Ferguson’s municipal court judge after Missouri’s supreme court ordered that all the court’s cases be transferred to the St Louis County circuit court, according to a source who was not authorised to speak publicly about the decision.
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A scathing report by the Department of Justice last week concluded that Ferguson’s police and court system was blighted by racial bias. Investigators accused Brockmeyer and his court officials of aggressively using the municipal court to raise revenue for the city. The policy is blamed by many for damaging relations between the city’s overwhelmingly white authorities and residents, two-thirds of whom are African American.
Brockmeyer, 70, was singled out by investigators as a driving force behind Ferguson’s strategy of using its municipal court to generate revenues aggressively. Investigators found that Brockmeyer had boasted of creating a range of new court fines, “many of which are widely considered abusive and may be unlawful”.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
Jon Swaine in New York
Monday 9 March 2015 23.53 GMT
A judge in Ferguson, Missouri, who is accused of running a modern-day debtors’ prison while fixing traffic tickets for himself and owing $170,000 in unpaid taxes, resigned on Monday as state authorities seized control of the city’s court system.
Ronald J Brockmeyer stepped down as Ferguson’s municipal court judge after Missouri’s supreme court ordered that all the court’s cases be transferred to the St Louis County circuit court, according to a source who was not authorised to speak publicly about the decision.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
A scathing report by the Department of Justice last week concluded that Ferguson’s police and court system was blighted by racial bias. Investigators accused Brockmeyer and his court officials of aggressively using the municipal court to raise revenue for the city. The policy is blamed by many for damaging relations between the city’s overwhelmingly white authorities and residents, two-thirds of whom are African American.
Brockmeyer, 70, was singled out by investigators as a driving force behind Ferguson’s strategy of using its municipal court to generate revenues aggressively. Investigators found that Brockmeyer had boasted of creating a range of new court fines, “many of which are widely considered abusive and may be unlawful”.
[font size=1]-snip-[/font]
Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/mar/09/ferguson-judge-resigns-ronald-brockmeyer
