Legislature Wrong on Felony Child Support
West Virginia legislators violated state and national constitutions when they forced fathers facing felony child support charges to prove they couldn’t pay, the Supreme Court of Appeals decided May 23.
The Justices unanimously erased a law stating that in child support prosecutions “the defendant’s alleged inability to reasonably provide the required support may be raised only as an affirmative defense, after reasonable notice to the State.”
The law “unconstitutionally shifts to a defendant the burden of disproving an element of the offense,” Justice Robin Davis wrote. “We have previously observed that it is a foundation of criminal law that the State must prove all the elements of a crime beyond a reasonable doubt.”
The law violates due process under Article III of the West Virginia Constitution and the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution. The agreement with the legal unconstitutionality of the West Virginia law also points clearly at the federal Bradley Amendment, if you are looking. Write your lawmaker and tell them you know: Bradley is unconstitutional and you want them to repeal the law in the name of the Constitution!
June 27, 2008 at 8:30 pm
[...] It can be argued that the welfare system and even child support measures are a wonderful thing for many. However, the cost to the country cannot be unconstitutional state and federal laws that are supported by politicians. An example is the federal Bradley Amendment along with a flotilla of state laws that support the violation of a number of Constitutional Rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution. Some state judges are revealing laws as unconstitutional and repealing them. [...]