UW Launches Study Of 'Debtors Prisons' Across US
If you're convicted of a felony in King County, you have to pay around $600 in fees to help cover court costs. In other parts of Washington, the price is even higher. It can be thousands of dollars in some counties. Plus, if you can't afford it you could end up back in jail.
Critics call these "modern day debtor's prisons" but little is known about how they operate across the U.S. Bill Radke talks to UW sociology professor Alexes Harris about why she's studying the impact of these large court fees in seven states.
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Bill Radke
Host
Bill hosts Week In Review and Words in Review. After starting with KUOW as a University of Washington student in 1985, Bill was KUOW's morning host in the '90s and the creator of past show, Rewind, a news-satire show heard on KUOW and nationwide on NPR. Bill moved away to Southern California to host American Public Media's Weekend America and Marketplace Morning Report and returned to KUOW in 2012.
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