Wake Up La Plata County! You have a thing called pre-trial services that provides no service.
It is where you are forced to pay the sheriff’s department $50 a month and up to $20 twice a week for urine analysis. It should rightly be called pre-trial sentencing!
Last I checked, it is not legal to sentence a person before they are found guilty. How did this practice begin? Where did come from?
Forcing someone do something or pay anything when they might be innocent has got to be illegal. You can bet that no one gets any of their money back if they are found innocent, and no way to return the time spent going to pee somewhere.
Worse is that this can all start because you were pulled over and the officer thought that your eyes were blood hot. So now law enforcement takes you to jail because you could not stand on one foot long enough. At jail, you won’t take a blood test because you don’t like needles. Lots of people cannot pass a roadside sobriety test when they are sober and even more are afraid of needles.
Now out on bail, you cannot drive anymore without SR22 expensive insurance and a thingamajig attached to your car that you have to blow into before it will start. It does not matter that you blew 0.0 on a Breathalyzer. Plus, you have to abide by the sentencing of the pre-trial services.
People, call your congressperson, call your senator, call the governor, heck, call your mother. This is wrong and has to be stopped.
All of us come home from work tired with bloodshot eyes once in a while. You could be next to be jailed and sentenced before ever pleading your case in front of a judge.
Lorraine J Rushing
Durango
