Don't feel like paying your library fine? Fine-go to jail.

[riverdeep]

"Woman Arrested For Failing To Return Library Books"

“I said, what could they possibly do? They can’t arrest me for this… I was wrong,” Dalibor said.

Dalibor did not respond to four notices from the library, two phone calls and two letters. The library forwarded the case to police, who issued a citation for Dalibor's failure to return the materials or pay the fine. The citation included a court date, which Dalibor admits she ignored.

With arrest warrant in hand, police showed up at Dalibor’s door and led her away in handcuffs.

http://www.wisn.com/news/17258567/detail.html?taf=mil#

Here is the menace to society:



The books? 'Angels and Demons' and 'White Oleander'. Never heard of them.

[Orangepeel]

1. okay. it seems like nothing else was getting her attention.

It sounds like she was arrested for ignoring a court date.

[riverdeep]

2. Any librarians out there?

Does this stuff get turned over to a collection agency (and so remain a civil matter), or does the hammer come down at some point like what happened here?

[MountainLaurel]

6. Different places have different rules

For some places, it might go to collection only if it's over $100 or $1,000. Some places send all fines more than 3 months overdue. With some, it's only seriously egregious fines (e.g., mom checks out the maximum of DVDs on her card and on the cards of her 7 children and doesn't return any of them). I've only been involved in one police-related matter. Woman and her family had checked out 20+ DVDs and not returned any of them. We wanted her charged with theft. The police wouldn't do anything until we got a certified letter to her, but she refused any mail from the library, so it was in limbo.

Academic libraries will get you in different ways: Have a fine, you can't get your grades, transcripts, or diploma. Unfortunately, a lot of times faculty were the worst offenders, and it's not like you could garnish their paychecks (which I found too bad). However, one college library where I worked noted that destruction and/or theft of library materials was automatically referred to the police because we were a function of the state government.

[riverdeep]

18. That woman who checked out the DVDs sounds like she had that planned.

When you're stealing from the library, you're really stealing from your neighbors.

Maybe they should make valid credit cards part of the agreement for checking out items worth more than, say, $20. Don't return it, get charged. Of course, poor people might shafted, but maybe they could come up with some other collateral.

[MountainLaurel]

26. It's quite possible

The town I worked in was quite interesting that way. And old mill town where half of the folks had lived there for at least a couple generations. The other half came there because of the cheap, month-to-month rentals (including a not-insubstantial contingent who were recently released from the state prison up the road). A lot of times, we could go down the local paper's list of recent arrests and check off items on the overdue list because the person who had checked them out was back in jail.

What's funny in the case I mentioned that more than a year after she was originally threatened with being charged (and we couldn't get the police to do anything), she figured we had forgotten about it and tried to sign the kids up for an event and gave us her new address. We sent her a new certified letter, which of course she never accepted, but she did decide it was the better part of valor to not try to use library services anymore.

[LeftyFingerPop]

3. I do not believe in capital punishment, but this shit has to stop. n/t

[Blue Gardener]

4. More for ignoring the court date

Than actually stealing the books, which she did if she wasn't going to return them. You can't just ignore the court date and expect them to do nothing.

[riverdeep]

15. You can if you're Karl Rove.

"You can't just ignore the court date and expect them to do nothing."

She gets a couple of overdue library books, ignores the court date, and gets arrested, and he commits acts of treason, ignores subpoenas, and walks around scott free creating more havoc.

Sorry, I got some GD in the lounge there. Force of habit.

[Mojambo]

5. People should respect their public libraries

They are really quite awesome.

[rug]

7. "she was in the middle of a Markus Zusak best seller -"The Book Thief"- when the cops came calling"

http://www.nypost.com/seven/08232008/news/nationalnews/this_nice_woman_was_arrested__handcuffed_125689.htm

[RetroLounge]

8. Just another Wisconsin Criminal...

Send her to SuperMax!

:rofl:

RL

[Dem_4_Life]

9. In San Antonio this would never happen...

My Mom works at the Library and they have people all the time that get away with never returning books or paying their fines and it gets looked over like it is nothing. I guess the people in Wisconsin are different.

[HEyHEY]

10. Is bookman running that library?

[fishwax]

11. people shouldn't steal from libraries

:shrug:

[Redstone]

13. Agreed.

Redstone

[Redstone]

12. I pay a LOT of overdue fines to the library, because I'm scatterbrained, but because

I use the library a whole lot more than the average person, I just consider it to be "book rental." So I don't mind.

Redstone

[Lex]

19. I do the same thing. Once I completely lost a book

and went to the library and told them I had lost a book and couldn't find it anywhere. I ask how I could pay for a replacement and it wasn't a giant deal.

[skygazer]

14. She was aware she had them, she was aware they were overdue

She was aware the library wanted them back.

While it may seem extreme, she ignored a court date. Besides, other than "The Book Thief" (which IS a good book) she seems to have horrible taste in literature, which should be a crime unto itself.

[Nikia]

16. Does anyone else think her booking photo looks too cheerful?

Our local paper publishes booking photos of people who fail to appear in court for their crimes and generally they look horrible because the people are not in a good mood. Miss Dalton doesn't appear to be in too bad of a mood despite her arrest.
I was told that our local paper used to publish the names of people who had not returned their books in a while or who owned large fines. I haven't seen this lately though.
Regardless of the the crime, usually people will be arrested if they ignore appearing in court.

[riverdeep]

20. Check out the link,

it has a video link a local TV station did with her. She doesn't really mind. This story for some reason is worldwide, it's appeared in newspapers from Pakistan to Germany. So she got some fame for it.

[Deja Q]

24. If she wanted fame, couldn't she stop wearing underwear & open her legs when the cameraman walks by?

It's kept one or two of her fellow generation in the, eh, spotlight...

:shrug:

[Deja Q]

23. Naah. She's just happy because the sign shrouds her cleavage.

:shrug:

[Lex]

17. STEALING

is a crime last I checked.

[grasswire]

21. if the object is to get the books back...

...then a library should have a periodic amnesty where a person can return books with penalties dropped. What is the object of a library? To encourage people to read? If that's the case, then think outside of the box. Make a way that people can work off their fines.

However....in Multnomah County Oregon the real problem has been CDs and DVDs that have just disappeared off the shelves. Just gone. Not checked out. That's a different can of worms.

[Deja Q]

25. And encourage people to be responsible by returning them on time.

Still, a society takes all sides.

I wonder what she was thinking, if the core issue was stealing?

[Orangepeel]

30. from the story, this woman doesn't sound particularly cooperative

it isn't like she lost the books and didn't have the money to pay. She just didn't return them and didn't care.

[Deja Q]

22. One day she'll end up like Bill Gates...

:D

At least she isn't Al Bundy. He had the most overdue book... 30 years! :rofl:

[mwooldri]

27. Well I have an overdue library book story.

I went to the same school my dad did. He left in 1963. Gave me some books, one of which was identified as being from the school library. In 1990, I returned it. Turns out the book was too old for general library use; I got it back!

Mark.

[Radical Activist]

28. She's a bad girl. Dangerous.

Cute too. I wouldn't mind meeting her in a library.

[HEyHEY]

31. I'll be they'll be a lot of young men with a sudden interest in reading after that photo gets out.

[sasquatch]

29. I would've given her a spanking

:yoiks: