Andrea Bopp Stark & Geoffrey Walsh on Carceral Bankruptcy

In this episode, Andrea Bopp Stark and Geoffrey Walsh, both staff attorneys at the National Consumer Law Center, discuss their work on fines and fees in bankruptcy case, with a particular focus on their article, Sentenced to a Life of Debt: It Is Time for a Reassessment of How Bankruptcy Law Intersects with Fines and Fees to Keep People in Debt. Geoff and Andrea explain how state and local governments have funded mass incarceration through the imposition of fines and fees in the criminal law arena and how this undermines many of the policy rationales articulated by the Supreme Court in Kelly v. Robinson, which made it much more difficult to discharge criminal justice debt in bankruptcy cases. We discuss possible solutions, including treating this debt like tax debt and why an analogy to tax debt is better than an analogy to student loan debt. Stark and Walsh have published several articles on this topic, including the one we primarily discussed, which is available in the Federal Sentencing Reporter and on the NCLC website.This episode was hosted by Matthew Bruckner, an associate professor at Howard University School of Law. Bruckner is on Twitter at @Prof_Bruckner. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Om Podcasten

Ipse Dixit is a podcast on legal scholarship. Each episode of Ipse Dixit features a different guest discussing their scholarship. The podcast also features several special series."From the Archives" consists historical recordings potentially of interest to legal scholars and lawyers."The Homicide Squad" consists of investigations of the true stories behind different murder ballads, as well as examples of how different musicians have interpreted the song over time."The Day Antitrust Died?" is co-hosted with Ramsi Woodcock, Assistant Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky College of Law, and consists of oral histories of the 1974 Airlie House Conference on antitrust law, a pivotal moment in the history of antitrust theory and policy.The hosts of Ipse Dixit are:Brian L. Frye, Spears-Gilbert Associate Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky College of LawLuce Nguyen, a student at Oberlin College and the co-founder of the Oberlin Policy Research Institute, an undergraduate public policy organization based at Oberlin CollegeMaybell Romero, Assistant Professor of Law at Northern Illinois University College of LawAntonia Eliason, Assistant Professor of Law at the University of Mississippi School of LawSaurabh Vishnubhakat, Associate Professor of Law at Texas A&M School of LawJohn Culhane, Professor of Law at Widener University Delaware Law SchoolBenjamin Edwards, Associate Professor of Law at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of LawMatthew Bruckner, Associate Professor of Law at Howard University School of LawComments and suggestions are always welcome at brianlfrye@gmail.com. You can follow the Ipse Dixit on Twitter at @IpseDixitPod. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.