Law and empathy at issue in jailing of a debtor

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Law and empathy at issue in jailing of a debtor

Specialists say judge erred on two fronts in sentencing pensioner over an unpaid $508

By Walter V. Robinson

Iheanyi D. Okoroafor was photographed at his home in South Hadley.
In a court system overburdened by the woes of thousands of debtors, what happened to Iheanyi D. Okoroafor is unheard of — a 73-year-old retiree being taken away in handcuffs because he had not paid a debt of $508.27.

As he exited the courtroom, he beseeched the judge: “My wife is in the hospital. I need to go and see her.’’
It happened on June 11 in Belchertown District Court, where Judge Robert S. Murphy Jr. found Okoroafor in contempt and sentenced him to 30 days in jail for defying a small-claims order to pay a debt to a local heating contractor.

Related
Audio: Man sentenced over debt
Murphy’s decision that Okoroafor had the money to settle the debt, according to an audiotape of the hearing, was based on the fact that Okoroafor receives a $2,000 monthly state pension. Under state law, however, state pensions cannot be considered by the court as income when calculating whether a defendant has the resources to pay off such a debt.

Compounding that apparent error, the judge made his decision without asking whether Okoroafor had a bank account and, if so, whether it held any funds.

Greta LaMountain Biagi, an Amherst attorney who was in the courtroom for an unrelated case, said she was moved to tears when Okoroafor was taken away in handcuffs.

“The judge’s decision was absolutely horrifying, and an abuse of discretion. He showed no empathy and no humanity,’’ said Biagi, who represents consumers in personal bankruptcy cases.
Okoroafor was freed at about 2 a.m. the next day, after his daughter, Amara Okoroafor, drove from Boston to the Hampshire County Jail in Northampton and paid the debt.

Dalié Jiménez, a law professor at the University of Connecticut School of Law who has done extensive research on debt collection laws, said the Massachusetts law that exempts state pension income from debtor judgments is clear. Therefore, she said, “the judge could not have ordered Mr. Okoroafor to pay the judgment from this income.’’

The State Retirement Board and other experts in debt collection agree with Jiménez’s interpretation of state law.

Jiménez, who reviewed the case file and audiotapes at The Boston Globe’s request, said that even if the income was not exempt, it was “particularly egregious’’ that the judge sent Okoroafor to jail, given his age, family circumstances, and size of the debt.

Last week, a court spokeswoman sidestepped questions about whether Murphy might have stumbled legally, or whether court officials believed his decision to jail Okoroafor was justified, saying that judges cannot comment on pending cases.

AUDIO: Listen to the court hearing

The spokeswoman, Erika Gully-Santiago, declined to discuss the case, but issued a statement: “The applicability of a statute is a legal question decided by judges in the context of a particular case. Judges apply the law to the facts they deem credible in rendering decisions.”

Contempt citations and jail sentences are rare in debt collection cases, and rarer still if the debtor is elderly or infirm. Court officials said they have no way to track how often it happens.

To some, Okoroafor is not a sympathetic figure: In the last 18 months, he has written angry letters denouncing the contractor, South Hadley’s Board of Health, and its Police Department, asserting there was a conspiracy against him. He even sent a complaint to a prior judge in the case, threatening to report him to the Judicial Conduct Commission.

Raymond E. Boisjolie, the Granby contractor who sued Okoroafor, said in an interview last week that he has lost much more than the $508.27 through having to attend a half-dozen court sessions.

Okoroafor, Boisjolie said, “is an idiot.’’ Okoroafor, in turn, has insisted all along that he should not have to pay Boisjolie because the contractor did not do the work but billed him anyway.

Okoroafor, who emigrated from Nigeria in 1978, has a doctorate in education from the University of Massachusetts. Before he retired in 2007 he was a supervisor in the state Department of Mental Health.

The case leaves Murphy, who was appointed to the District Court two years ago, in an awkward position. The judge, whose only role in the case was presiding over the June 11 hearing, is not permitted to comment.

District Court judges typically juggle large criminal caseloads, and cases such as health commitments and evictions. In the District Courts, where staff has been cut by 16 percent since 2006, judges must do their own legal research.

Against that backdrop, Murphy and his colleagues are supposed to know the intricacies of debt collection law, including which income is exempt from judgment.

And small-claims cases like Okoroafor’s seldom require the intervention of judges; court clerks usually adjudicate the disputes.

In April 2013, Boisjolie won a default judgment because Okoroafor did not show up for a hearing. Okoroafor’s subsequent hand-crafted motions to set aside the judgment and hold a hearing were denied…..more here

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