Maryland Cancels Debt Owed by 6,715 Parolees
On October 4, 2024, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D) announced that the state Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services (DPSCS) was canceling nearly $13 million in debt owed for unpaid supervision and drug-testing fees by 6,715 former state prisoners currently on parole.
The move came just days after a new law took effect on October 1, 2024, eliminating those fees. Signed by Moore in May 2024, House Bill 531 removed a supervision fee for which DPSCS was charging parolees $40-50 monthly. The new law also stopped the state Parole Commission from requiring former prisoners still under supervision to pay drug and alcohol testing fees, except under certain circumstances.
State Attorney General Anthony G. Brown (D) called the new law a step toward “eliminating mass incarceration.” State Del. Elizabeth M. Embry (D-Baltimore), who sponsored the legislation, couched it in terms of fairness.
“These are people that either don’t have a job or will struggle to gain employment, and we’re taking money out of their paycheck,” she said. “Even if someone is able to come up with it, it’s probably at the expense of another need that they have.”
Brown also noted that fees disproportionately impacted lower income prisoners, most of them Black, a group overrepresented in state prisons; though just 30% of the state population, Blacks account for 71% of its prisoners.
Additional source: Baltimore Banner, US News
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