Seven states bar people with a criminal record from receiving victim's compensation

[Angrboda]

Seven states bar people with a criminal record from receiving compensation when they themselves are the victims of crime

After his father was murdered in Sarasota, Florida, in 2015, Anthony "Amp" Campbell was in shock. Not only had he lost his role model and supporter, he also worried about coming up with $10,000 to pay for the funeral and burial.

Campbell, an Alabama State University football coach, emptied most of his savings but still could not cover the whole cost. Sarasota police urged him to apply to Florida’s crime victim compensation fund for help. Every state has such a fund to reimburse people for the financial wallop that can come with being a victim.

The answer was no. His father, Johnnie Campbell, had been convicted of burglary in 1983 after a late-night break-in attempt at a local business, and Florida law is clear: people with certain types of felonies in their past cannot receive victim's aid. It did not matter that the elder Campbell had changed in 30 years—the Sarasota City Commission called him a “prominent citizen” a month after his death—or that his son had never committed a crime.

Florida is one of seven states that bar people with a criminal record from receiving victim compensation. The laws are meant to keep limited funds from going to people who are deemed undeserving. But the rules have had a broader effect: an analysis of records in two of those states—Florida and Ohio—shows that the bans fall hardest on black victims and their families, like the Campbells.

In Florida, the ban applies to anyone who has been convicted as an adult of one of a constellation of felonies, including burglary and aggravated assault. In that state, about 30 percent of people who listed their race when applying for victim compensation in 2015 and 2016 were black. But black applicants made up 61 percent of people denied aid for having a criminal record, according to the analysis by The Marshall Project and Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting, in conjunction with the USA TODAY Network.

The racial disparity was similar in Ohio, which denies compensation to people not just convicted of a felony in the past 10 years but simply suspected of certain felonies, even if they were never found guilty or committed the crime as a juvenile. In Ohio, 42 percent of victims who applied for reimbursement in 2016 and listed their race were black. But 61 percent of people turned down for having a record were black.

Is this right? What do you think?