Legal Question in Civil Litigation in Michigan

It appears that Michigan is charging prisoners who have money or other assets for their room and board. Many states file liens against the property of persons who commit crimes and then fail to pay for their court appointed attorneys and/or court fines and costs. There are fewer "free-rides" available for either law abiding or law breaking persons, as working families lose their homes, propety taxes fall as property values fall, income taxes fall as people lose their jobs, and government offices and prisons struggle with budget cuts.

Your father's nest egg is being taken to provide for his care and feeding. He can dispute this, but will be hard pressed to convince a court that this is not reasonable. He should contact a criminal law attorney, but if he has an income, he should be prepared to pay for his representation.

see online article from 1996:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1295/is_n7_v60/ai_18410228/

Michigan has one of the more established pay-to-stay programs. Relying on a previously dormant, sixty-year-old law known as the Prisoners Reimbursement Act, the Michigan attorney general's office has launched an aggressive campaign of lawsuits against inmates it deems able to pay the $40-a-day cost of their incarceration.

In 1994 the state collected $400,000 from prison inmates' bank accounts and pensions. And every year the Department of Corrections collects up to $1 million in rent from prisoners in halfway houses and prison work camps. "Taxpayers like the idea that we don't allow prisoners to profit from their crimes," says Attorney General Frank Kelley.

But not everyone agrees. Louise Grable contended that the state was unfair when it took 90 percent of her sixty-three-year-old, incarcerated husband's $398 monthly General Motors pension. He's currently serving three to sixteen years for sexually molesting a young girl, and he left his wife with no income other than the pension.