On July 28, 2023, Donte Peoples was working as a truck driver and making a delivery at Grissom Air Reserve Base in Indiana when he encountered a problem.
A security guard, he said, informed him that his driver’s license was suspended for unpaid child support. The development set off a chain of events that “totally wiped out everything.” He lost his job, fell behind on rent and was evicted from his apartment.
“I try to be strong, and I try to just hope for the best and try to push forward,” Peoples, 35, said in a recent interview at his sister’s home in Baltimore County, “but it’s just really hard.”
Peoples, though, did not owe any child support. He had custody of his 15-year-old son, Donte Jr., and a Baltimore judge ruled in 2017 that he was no longer required to make payments.
The Baltimore Banner thanks its sponsors. Become one.
Maryland Legal Aid, the state’s largest provider of free civil legal services, alleges that what happened to Peoples is not an isolated incident. The private nonprofit law firm asserts that the state is relying on a broken automated system and routinely suspending driver’s licenses for unpaid child support without due process and in cases in which it is not permitted to do so under the law.
Attorneys with Legal Aid this week put the state on notice of legal action in three cases. They’re seeking compensation for their clients and an injunction to prevent this from happening to them and other parents in the future.
In a statement, Stephen Patterson, a spokesperson for the Maryland Department of Human Services, wrote that it has not yet received the notice of claims from Legal Aid or the treasurer’s office.
“When we do, we will review and respond accordingly,” Patterson said.
Under the law, the Maryland Child Support Administration can notify the Motor Vehicle Administration if people with regular driver’s licenses are 60 days or more behind on child support, or those with commercial driver’s licenses are 120 days or more behind.
The Baltimore Banner thanks its sponsors. Become one.
The child support administration is required to send written notice to people that includes their right to request an investigation on several grounds. Those include if the information is incorrect, if a driver’s license suspension would be an impediment to current or potential employment or if individuals have a disability that prevents them from being able to work.
If people ask for an investigation, the agency must conduct one and notify them in writing of the results. The child support administration also has to let them know about their right to appeal to the Office of Administrative Hearings.
In 2023, Maryland suspended about 20,512 driver’s licenses related to outstanding child support. The NAACP Maryland State Conference reported that Black parents comprised 71% of these suspensions from 2015-2020.
Stacy Bensky, a Legal Aid attorney who represents Peoples, said parents often do not receive notice that their driver’s license is going to be suspended — a violation of their right to due process.
People often find out, she said, after the police pull them over for driving on a suspended license.
The Baltimore Banner thanks its sponsors. Become one.
Bensky said the state also suspends driver’s licenses even when people fall under one of the exceptions in the law.
“Their system is blatantly illegal,” Bensky said. “It operates as if the law doesn’t exist.”
Daniel Hatcher, a professor of law at the University of Baltimore School of Law whose research has focused on government agencies and programs that are supposed to help vulnerable populations but often harm or use them as a source of revenue, said driver’s license suspensions take away the ability of low-income people to work and bring their children to appointments.
Parents who then chose to drive anyway can be charged with driving on a suspended license. Hatcher said that only makes it harder for them to work — and everyone is harmed under those circumstances.
Even if people receive notice of a driver’s license suspension, Hatcher said, many do not have access to a lawyer or know how to navigate the system. They might be able to resolve the issue once, he said, but the automated system will then soon restart the process.
The Baltimore Banner thanks its sponsors. Become one.
“It feels hopeless. And, unfortunately, that’s understandable,” Hatcher said. “You end up in a situation where the child support agency that is supposed to exist to help children is actually spending state funds and federal funds in a way that causes harm.”
Hatcher said the state should change its practices to only pursue driver’s license suspensions if that would be in the best interest of the children.
In written testimony to lawmakers on Feb. 29, Maryland Secretary of Human Services Rafael López said he wanted to provide clarity about “long held misunderstandings” about driver’s license suspensions for unpaid child support.
López said the department was “concerned with the repeating narrative” that the agency uses a random lottery system for driver’s license suspensions. He asked legislators for help in dispelling that myth.
The child support administration, he said, experienced “system issues” during the last two years when implementing a new management system. But López said the agency strictly complies with the law.
The Baltimore Banner thanks its sponsors. Become one.
He said the process of notifying people that their driver’s license will be suspended creates an incentive for them to contact their local child support office and access services.
The program, he said, is an “early intervention method” that’s critical to making sure that parents do not rack up excessive unpaid child support that can lead to “more aggressive enforcement mechanisms, including incarceration for contempt and additional penalties.”
“DHS recognizes that there is a difference between an inability to pay child support and unwillingness to pay,” López said. “Therefore, when a driver license suspension negatively impacts an obligor’s ability to pay child support, they can challenge a driver’s license suspension because it would be an impediment to current or potential employment.”
Peoples, the truck driver, said he would get the runaround from the child support administration despite telling the agency that he did not owe money and showing them court orders.
His attorneys reported that four times he experienced a wrongful driver’s license suspension.
The Baltimore Banner thanks its sponsors. Become one.
Sometimes, Peoples said, child support administration employees would tell him that they would take care of the issue. Other times, he said, caseworkers instructed him to make a payment.
He said he’s currently looking for work. Though Peoples said his driver’s license is no longer being suspended, he’s still waiting for the state to expunge the wrongful suspensions from his driving record.
The Baltimore City Office of Child Support Services did not dispute that any driver’s license suspensions that he experienced after Aug. 19, 2016, were in error. That’s when the judge’s ruling that he no longer had to pay child support became effective.
“I know I’m not the only one,” Peoples said. “I just want it to stop, and it don’t want it to happen to nobody else.”
Comments
Welcome to The Banner's subscriber-only commenting community. Please review our community guidelines.