PA Woman Jailed For Truancy Fines Found Dead in Jail Cell

[SeanTX]

We don't have debtors prisons anymore -- unless you owe a debt to the State. Then they'll toss you in a cage and if you die there, oh well, sucks to be you!

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crim...icle-1.1825689

Pennsylvania woman jailed for truancy fines dies in cell
.
BY Nicole Hensley
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Wednesday, June 11, 2014, 2:11 PM


A woman sentenced to two days in jail for not paying $2,000 in fines after her kids skipped school - died in her cell.

Guards at Berks County Jail in Pennsylvania found Eileen DiNino, 55, of Reading, unresponsive in her bunk bed on Saturday afternoon as they checked blood pressure for all the patients.

She was declared dead shortly after at a local hospital.

She had $2,000 in truancy fines and Judge Dean Patton had to give her jail time, reported the Reading Eagle, but she “should not have died alone in prison,” he said.

snip

“This women died in prison - away from her family - and for what?” Barnhardt said. “What did she learn from this?”

[Working Poor]

“What did she learn from this?”

That you can be dead wrong?

[Working Poor]

“What did she learn from this?”

That you can be dead wrong?

[Warrior_of_Freedom]

Pennsylvania woman jailed for truancy fines dies in cell
.
BY Nicole Hensley
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Wednesday, June 11, 2014, 2:11 PM


A woman sentenced to two days in jail for not paying $2,000 in fines after the state's leased kids skipped school - died in her cell.

Guards at Berks County Jail in Pennsylvania found Eileen DiNino, 55, of Reading, unresponsive in her bunk bed on Saturday afternoon as they checked blood pressure for all the patients.

She was declared dead shortly after at a local hospital.

She had $2,000 in truancy fines and Judge Dean Patton had to give her jail time, reported the Reading Eagle, but she “should not have died alone in prison,” he said.

snip

“This women died in prison - away from her family - and for what?” Barnhardt said. “What did she learn from this?”

fixed

[Anti Federalist]

Government schools are people abuse.

[Mani]

HOLY $#@!.

She got fined coz her kids were absent too much??? And that sent her to jail and killed her?

Growing up my friend Mikey was missing tons of school for weird reasons all the time....His mom could have been jailed now?

WOW.


Wait...I thought kids could drop out of school and then get a G.E.D? Is that not true anymore?? Now your mom goes to jail if your report card doesn't come back on time?




http://www.salon.com/2014/06/12/woma..._school_fines/

A Pennsylvania woman died in a jail cell over the weekend while serving a 48-hour sentence for her children’s unpaid school fines. Eileen DiNino was found dead on Saturday in a Berks County jail cell where she was midway through the sentence that would have eliminated around $2,000 in fines and related court fees related to her children’s attendance at school.

Snip

More than 1,600 people have been jailed in Berks County alone — the majority of them women — because of similar fines. MOM's are being rounded up because they forgot to turn in School Attendance logs??? WTF IS THIS!?!?!??!?!! HOLY $#@! PEOPLE! CHINA ISN'T EVEN THAT $#@!ED UP!!!!!!!


Patton said he has lost sleep over her death. At the same time, he acknowledged that a short jail stint can sometimes “break the habit” of parents who’d rather party into the night than take their children to school the next day. The county started a program a few years ago that gives families 30 to 60 days to keep daily logs of each class and assignment. He estimated that the district truancy rate had dropped more than 30 percent.

DiNino did not work or appear to have much help with four children still at home, according to Patton. She frequently skipped hearings, or arrived without requested documents.

“She cared about her kids, but her kids ruled the roost,” Patton said. “She was just accepting what was coming, and (would) let the cards fall where they may.” (SO That's a good enough reason to send her to jail???? Coz her parenting skills aren't good enough for you, because she didn't fill out your logs???)


Snip

The circumstances of DeNino’s death are a stark and tragic reminder of how being poor is considered a crime worthy of punishment in the United States. Thousands have been jailed in Berks County for failure to pay truancy fines, but court fees and other fines have put thousands of others behind bars across the country.
As an investigation by National Public Radio revealed, a homeless man was sentenced to a year in jail because he couldn’t pay the $2,600 penalty he incurred after shoplifting a $2 can of beer. A teenager was jailed for three days because he couldn’t pay the fine associated with catching a fish off season.



I love how the judge says, "we don't have debtor's prison"...Then proceeds to jail this women...because of her debts....

and feels he had no other choice...How far down the road to kookoo land did this judge go where he feels he HAS NO CHOICE but to jail a women for her kids missing school.

Hey judge...The reason you can't sleep, is because your conscious is telling you that you are $#@!ing insane to put this women in jail over school fees and you got her killed...FOR NO REASON.

[Czolgosz]

Lol at america. Same stupid humans.

[XNavyNuke]

Unsurprising at this point.

Update:
No charges in case of Pa. mom who died in jail over truancy fines: Justice?

Now, a state police review of the 55-year-old Reading woman's death on June 7 death has determined that no criminal charges should be filed, the Associated Press reports.

An autopsy found that she died of natural causes, including high blood pressure that contributed to heart failure, the AP reports.

XNN

[Anti Federalist]

Unsurprising at this point.

Update:
No charges in case of Pa. mom who died in jail over truancy fines: Justice?


XNN

And the stress of being dragged off to prison in irons had, oh, nothing at all to do with it?

$#@! this...if the idiots in this country had one tenth the nuts we had 250 years ago, there would be a Ferguson every single $#@!ing night.

[HOLLYWOOD]

I wonder how much the PA taxpayers will be on the hook when the civil lawsuit against the state is settled secretively sealed court docs?

All the way around, the innocent always pay and the dictators are never held responsible... whata a racket.

[Philhelm]

I'm ready to accept pledges of fealty. Better an enlightended despot than the legions of Hell.