## Facts

- Several former criminal defendants in Orleans Parish Criminal District Court (OPCDC) pleaded guilty between 2011 and 2014 and were assessed fines and fees.
- Plaintiffs alleged they were arrested for nonpayment, required to post a $20,000 bond, and jailed for days to weeks.
- OPCDC operated a Judicial Expense Fund (JEF) used for court operations (e.g., staff and maintenance), distinct from judges’ salaries.
- A significant portion of the JEF (about one quarter) was funded by collections of criminal fines and fees imposed on defendants in OPCDC.
- The OPCDC judges had exclusive authority to control and allocate JEF spending and were responsible for accounting for the OPCDC budget to city officials.
- Judges created and supervised a collections department that sent warning letters and, upon continued nonpayment, issued alias capias warrants for contempt and set cash bail.
- Plaintiffs alleged enforcement occurred without an inquiry into ability to pay.
- After the lawsuit began, judges changed certain practices, including reclaiming warrant authority, recalling most active warrants for unpaid fines and fees, and canceling substantial court debt.

## Issues

1. Whether due process is violated when judges who adjudicate and enforce fines and fees also control a court fund substantially supported by those fines and fees, creating a structural financial conflict of interest.
2. Whether the due process principles of Tumey and Ward apply to an institutional financial interest in court funding, not just a judge’s personal financial gain.

## Decision

- The Fifth Circuit affirmed summary judgment for plaintiffs on their Fourteenth Amendment due process claim.
- The court held that OPCDC judges’ dual role—deciding and enforcing defendants’ fines and fees while managing and depending on fine-and-fee revenue for court operations—created an unconstitutional structural conflict of interest.
- The court treated the due process violation as structural, requiring no showing of actual subjective bias.
- The court emphasized the holding was driven by the specific funding structure and degree of judicial control and budgetary responsibility present at OPCDC.

## Legal Principles

- Due process requires a neutral decisionmaker; a system that creates a constitutionally intolerable risk of bias violates the Fourteenth Amendment even without proof of actual bias.
- A “possible temptation” to favor revenue-generating outcomes can disqualify an adjudicator when the adjudicator has a substantial pecuniary stake in the proceeding’s outcome.
- Structural-bias doctrine can apply when adjudicators have a significant institutional financial interest—such as controlling a budget materially dependent on fines and fees they impose and collect—particularly when they also supervise enforcement mechanisms affecting defendants.
- The constitutionality of fine-and-fee funding depends on specific facts; not all use of fines and fees to support court operations is per se unconstitutional.

## Conclusion

The Fifth Circuit held that due process was denied because OPCDC judges, who controlled and were accountable for a court operations fund materially financed by fines and fees, also adjudicated and enforced those same financial obligations, creating an unconstitutional structural risk of bias in ability-to-pay and enforcement proceedings.


Cain v. White, 937 F.3d 446 (5th Cir. 2019)