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the police came to our house on Tuesday
I never received the eviction notice
we came in and I explained the situation
they offered him 90 days in jail because
I fail you to vacate it it's
unconstitutional it's a hard life for
renters in Arkansas it's the only state
in America with no implied warranty of
habitability or in other words landlords
are not required to make repairs or
maintain their properties perhaps more
radical it's the only state where you
can be prosecuted fined and jailed for
not paying rent on time every year more
than two thousand people are charged
under Arkansas is failure to vacate low
Dustin Duke is a legal aid attorney he
specializes in representing tenants in
failure to vacate cases failure to
vacate has passed at the beginning of
the last century the quest of landlords
is a easy cheap method to dispossessed
tenants of their property with really
minimal effort on the landlord's part
because the state is is taking over that
role for them if a tenant is even a day
late on rent the landlord can begin the
eviction process tenants are given only
ten days to vacate the property a
conviction can carry a fine up to a
hundred dollars for each day the tenant
remains in the property and up to 90
days in jail it just it's just black and
white is your rent due yes or no did you
pay the rent if the answer is no and you
haven't gotten out in 10 days then you
can be convicted under the statute it's
a crime this makes things difficult for
the third of Arkansas's residents who
are renters and have legitimate concerns
about the properties they're occupying
tenants are required to pay rent even if
their landlords aren't maintaining their
properties Arkansas is the second
poorest state in America and 18% of the
population that lived below the poverty
line are now being swept up into the
criminal justice system Kim Barnes was
evicted for being late on rent
they actually fingerprinted me and took
a motion like I was a criminal
I said out of this just cause a failure
to vacate Barnes claimed she'd paid the
rent on time but the landlord refused to
take her payment with me in my situation
I'm gonna make sure my kids have a roof
over they hated that rent gonna be the
first thing I pay out I had proof that I
had the the money order she just wanted
us out under Arkansas is criminal
eviction statute Burns was given 10 days
to move despite claiming she moved
before the time period ended her
landlord pressed charges for failure to
vacate I hit re boom once I got my visa
notice and she wouldn't work with us we
just said okay we'll move and then I had
to go to court today he asked me how do
I plead on fare to vacate and I said not
guilty because I mean I'm not guilty
because I was out of this woman's place
in reasonable time like she asked me to
be after she still when they sent my
payment
I have to go back in April hoped about
it I have all my paperwork showing what
dates I did exactly move out
challenging a criminal eviction is
tricky if a tenant like Barnes wants to
plead not guilty and take their case to
trial they first have to pay the full
amount of rent that the landlord claims
they owe in to the court so there's a
real incentive there for the tentative
just to leave to get out of the premises
and especially considering that they're
now facing a crime most the time it's
just the matter of the tenant getting
out and you might say well what's wrong
with that
if they owe money maybe they should get
out but the problem is the way the
system is set up it allows landlords to
abuse the system the tenant very rarely
is a chance to give their side of the
story you might be withholding the rent
because landlord promised to make
repairs you never get to raise those
claims of course because this isn't a
civil matter you don't get to raise
counterclaims in a criminal lawsuit well
let's just assume that it's just a
straight-up
non-payment of rent case even then you
got a question the wisdom of deciding in
this particular case that the state
wants to pick up the tab
the state of Arkansas bears the cost of
deploying members of law enforcement to
serve evictions and providing
prosecutors for court proceedings it
only cost the landlords as a small
processing fee that is good news for
landlords and their representatives
Jason Baldwin is a real estate attorney
in a landlord with more than 60
properties the criminal method is not as
radical as it may seem I've been
handling hundreds of evictions over the
years I've never once seen a tenant ever
serve a day in jail due to the criminal
eviction statute that would say 90% of
all evictions in Arkansas use the
criminal method it's fairly simple and
easy and inexpensive if the tenant is
staying in your property and not paying
the rent
essentially the tenants allowed to steal
from you it's a crime akin to a parking
ticket you park at the meter you don't
put any money in to that meter well then
you can be ticketed I don't live in my
car maybe the people who are comparing
it to a parking ticket do live in their
cars but this is somebody's home that's
that's being taken away from them and
their conduct is being criminalized
tenants are sometimes jailed under this
statute currently the data on the number
of tenants jailed in cases related to
Arkansas as criminal eviction statute is
not available to the public in fact much
of the information available about the
reality of landlord tenant relations in
Arkansas has not come from the state but
from legal researchers like Lynn foster
with the landlord tenant situation you
have kind of the poorest segments of our
society being penalized for this
behavior which in every other state is
not criminal behavior I think that's one
reason why nothing much has been done
and not much attention has been focused
on it
in 2011 foster joined a state assembled
commission of tenant advocates industry
groups lawyers and judges to recommend
modifications to Arkansas as
landlord-tenant law their report
released in the winter of 2012
recommended repealing failure to vacate
what the Commission recommended
unanimously was that a better
civilization statute be put into place
then the failure to vacate statute
should be repealed by the legislature
the commission's recommendations were
approved by representatives of all
parties most importantly tenants rights
advocates in both major associations
representing landlords and realtors but
implementing the recommendations have
approved daunting my initial thought
when I received the commission's
recommendations was that we might be
able to turn that into legislation and
try to get something passed during the
session that we were currently in it
became clear to us pretty quickly that
the Realtors and the landlord's were
very vehemently against this issue and
would lobby hard against it I don't
think I expected that kind of opposition
to happen so quickly and so strongly it
seemed like the recommendations were the
result of consensus the Arkansas
Realtors Association proved to have an
influential lobby they circulated a
letter around the legislature in
opposition to the commission's
recommendations after that few lawmakers
would consider the proposed changes in a
letter to their membership the
Association celebrated that they had
stopped the bill it mentioned that they
had fought legislation intended to
fundamentally change landlord tenant
practices in Arkansas and that the
municipal eviction process would have
been eliminated and warranty of
habitability imposed in other words
evictions in Arkansas can no longer be
criminalized and landlords would be
required under the law like the rest of
the United States to maintain their
properties after repeated requests for
an interview or a statement the Arkansas
Realtors Association refused to comment
there is at least one very very powerful
Lobby that works on behalf of folks who
are landlords and tenants do not have
any correspondingly powerful lobby on
the other hand of course if you're
counting votes there are more tenants in
Arkansas then there are landlords about
a third of all our Kansans are tenants
so the numbers would be on the tenants
side the money may be on the landlord's
side lawmakers in Arkansas meet only for
a few months every two years to pass
legislation the failure to vacate law
won't be debated again until 2015 it's
embarrassing for Arkansas to be an
outlier in this way to use law
enforcement to enforce a private
contract is pretty unheard of
we don't have debtor prisons in the
United States anymore it is not a
violation of international rights rather
it is simply a tool that allows people
to cost effectively remove a tenant who
is failing to pay the rent and admitting
before a judge that they have refused to
pay the rent and remained in the
property when we're allocating resources
are we really wanting to supplement
their profits are we really trying to
supplement the landlord's when we can
use these resources for so many other
things are so much better the tenant
they're intimidated by the process they
don't have lawyers most of the time and
they're facing not only the the prospect
of owing a lot of money but even the
possibility of jail time things come up
kids you see parents can see you you see
and stop trying to bring in cops into
did really not every day Baker concerns
is the streets
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