YOUNGSTOWN Traffic cases burden courts

If not for driving-under-suspension charges, Youngstown would need two, not three, judges, an official says.
By PATRICIA MEADE
VINDICATOR CRIME REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Gerald E. Pusey says he's not a bad guy; he's just got a bad driving record.
Pusey, who has driven without a valid license for at least nine years, talked from the cell-side of a plastic partition at the Mahoning County jail. The South Side man has nine convictions for driving with a suspended license.
In the past three months, bench warrants were issued when he failed to appear for trials on two more driving-under-suspension charges from April and July.
His arrest Nov. 2 upped the pending DUS charges to three.
All three charges are set for Thursday in municipal court. If he's convicted, the maximum penalty for each DUS is six months in jail and, if the penalties run consecutively, that's 18 months.
Pusey, 45, of Hudson Avenue, is serving 30 days on a drug paraphernalia conviction. A crack pipe was found Nov. 2 in his 1987 white Cadillac DeVille.
Patrolman Robert Deichman, working laser enforcement that day, clocked Pusey's Cadillac going 49 mph in a 35 mph zone on the Center Street bridge. Deichman stopped the car on Wilson Avenue.
Pusey told the officer that he didn't have a valid license and provided an Ohio Human Services identification card in the name of Derrell Pusey. When Deichman checked the Social Security number on the ID, it came back "nothing in file."
A further check revealed that Derrell Pusey, Gerald Pusey's brother, died in 1991.
Pusey then admitted his identity.
"I'm tired of this s--- haunting me," Pusey said during the jail interview. "I have to survive -- do they understand that?"
What he owes
Pusey said he's bought -- then lost -- probably a dozen cars over the years.
Some cars were forfeited through court order; others he couldn't afford to claim from an impound lot. A valid license and proof of insurance are necessary before a car impounded by police can be released.
Pusey hasn't been able to pay license reinstatement fees -- which he estimates are more than $5,000. He described himself as a self-employed mechanic who barely makes a living.
The amount Pusey owes to the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles doesn't surprise Richard J. Billak, chief executive officer at Community Corrections Association Inc. The halfway facility on Market Street provides its inmates with a mandatory eight-hour remedial driving course.
Billak said his agency did a snapshot in time one day of jail inmates and calculated that $700 was the average amount each owed the BMV.
The fee for a third offense noncompliance reinstatement is $500.
Billak would like to see legislative action that would forgive past-due BMV fines upon completion of a remedial driving course and a petition of indigency filed with the court.
He suggested the Ohio Department of Human Services could then provide a fund for minimal insurance coverage, say six to 12 months, for welfare-to-work clients at $30 to $50 per month.
Billak has asked state Rep. Sylvester Patton of Youngstown, D-64th, to explore the possibility of changing the law.
The current BMV setup, Billak said, unfairly targets the working poor and the result is a cycle of repeat offenders.
Incarcerating multiple offenders, which costs taxpayers roughly $60 each day and leads to jail overcrowding, isn't the best answer, he said.
"Shouldn't the black caucus say 'Can't we fix this?'" Billak said. "If [poor people] can't afford a lawyer, how can they pay fines?"
What's needed
Billak, however, agreed with the assertion of municipal Judge Elizabeth A. Kobly that offenders who served no jail time for DUS were done a disservice by the courts. They had no incentive to obtain a valid license, she said.
Each day's arrest records in the city reflect that traffic stops, more often than not, involve a driver with a suspended license. Judge Kobly calls DUS the No. 1 crime in the city.
Billak said the municipal courts could operate with two judges instead of three -- if it weren't for the volume of DUS cases.
Despite his DUS convictions, Pusey received little or no jail time. The only exception was in November 2000, when Judge Kobly sentenced him to 60 days in jail.
The most Pusey has spent behind bars -- unrelated to his driving -- was six months on a felony drug conviction that landed him in state prison in 2000. On Aug. 23, 2000, the day after his release, he racked up his eighth DUS.
Still, he drove.
Over the years, Pusey has driven uninsured unsafe vehicles, sometimes with fictitious plates.
He has failed -- several times -- to appear in court when due, which meant warrants were issued to bring him in. By not showing in court yet continuing to drive, he ended up with multiple DUS charges.
To resolve cases, Pusey generally reached a plea agreement in which one or more charges, such as fictitious plates, were dismissed.
Records show that he seldom paid his fines, which then resulted in more bench warrants for failure to comply with court orders. In the end, judges have usually allowed him to perform community service in lieu of fines and costs.
Pusey said he wants amnesty from the BMV. He said you can't squeeze money from someone who doesn't have it.
meade@vindy.com