logo
    • Magazine
    • Membership
    • Donate
  • Racial Justice
  • Economic Justice
    • Collections
  • Climate Justice
  • Health Justice
  • Leadership
  • CONTENT TYPES
  • Subscribe
  • Webinars
    • Upcoming Webinars
    • Complimentary Webinars
    • Premium On-Demand Webinars
  • Membership
  • Submissions

Churches Key to Fugitive Surrender Programs

Rick Cohen
November 4, 2010
Share
Tweet
Share
Email
Print

November 3, 2010; Source: USA Today | If you were on the lam, would you rather turn yourself in at City Hall, the police headquarters, a civic center, or a local church?

The “Fugitive Safe Surrender” program of the U.S. Marshals Service encourages people with outstanding warrants for nonviolent offenses to turn themselves in at designated churches on special “safe surrender” days.  By participating in the program, fugitives don’t get off the hook , but they are viewed a bit more kindly by the courts for turning themselves in, sometimes getting probation or reduced fine and sometimes getting referrals for job training or substance abuse counseling.

Sign up for our free newsletters

Subscribe to NPQ's newsletters to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

By signing up, you agree to our privacy policy and terms of use, and to receive messages from NPQ and our partners.

Fugitives turn themselves in at participating churches and are processed through makeshift courts at the churches or close by. Although it sounds like a great thing for churches to do – using their spaces as a kind of sanctuary for people on the run—some people are concerned that using churches for government court or law enforcement activities violates the separation of church and state. New Jersey officials think that using churches is a lot better than having fugitives surrender at the civic center or some other public building, because even though “bad guys” may not be much as regular church-goers, their relatives might be and they might tell their scofflaw offspring to turn themselves over through the good offices of the church rather than an officious government setting. In New Jersey, while the fugitives surrender in churches, the cases then get dealt with in a separate, secular building nearby, such as a school, in order to avoid the church/state issue. One example from New Jersey is telling. A 41-year-old woman with 13 outstanding warrants turned herself in at a church in Camden. Homeless, on drugs, and supporting herself through prostitution, she hadn’t been in a church in 28 years. She said she would never have turned herself in anywhere but at a church.

The Safe Surrender program helped her consolidate her warrants, get counseling and drug treatment, and begin the process of clearing her record. Now, she is a grant writer for a nonprofit based in Wilmington, Delaware. So long as the state does its case processing in a building other than the church, using the church to get fugitives to turn themselves in and begin to straighten out their lives seems like a socially productive use of a church’s tax exempt status.—Rick Cohen

Share
Tweet
Share
Email
Print
About the author
Rick Cohen

Rick joined NPQ in 2006, after almost eight years as the executive director of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy (NCRP). Before that he played various roles as a community worker and advisor to others doing community work. He also worked in government. Cohen pursued investigative and analytical articles, advocated for increased philanthropic giving and access for disenfranchised constituencies, and promoted increased philanthropic and nonprofit accountability.

More about: Nonprofit NewsReligious/Faith-Based

Become a member

Support independent journalism and knowledge creation for civil society. Become a member of Nonprofit Quarterly.

Members receive unlimited access to our archived and upcoming digital content. NPQ is the leading journal in the nonprofit sector written by social change experts. Gain access to our exclusive library of online courses led by thought leaders and educators providing contextualized information to help nonprofit practitioners make sense of changing conditions and improve infra-structure in their organizations.

Join Today
logo logo logo logo logo
See comments

Spring-2023-sidebar-subscribe
You might also like
Reparations, One Organization at a Time
Martin Levine
Pope Francis Says Unfettered Capitalism is Unsupportable
Ruth McCambridge
Supreme Court Ruling on Churches and COVID-19 May Be Overtaken by Events
Carole Levine
The Open-and-Shut Case of Liberty University
Marian Conway
Organizing Religious Communities to Work for a Just Peace
Chelsea Dennis
Christian Healthcare Sharing Programs Face Heightened State Scrutiny
Karen Kahn

NPQ Webinars

April 27th, 2 pm ET

Liberatory Decision-Making

How to Facilitate and Engage in Healthy Decision-making Processes

Register Now
You might also like
AOC’s “Tax the Rich” Dress Dazzles Met Gala, while...
Anastasia Reesa Tomkin
Foundation Giving Numbers for 2020 Show 15 Percent Increase
Steve Dubb
Strike MoMA Imagines Art Museums without Billionaires
Tessa Crisman

Like what you see?

Subscribe to the NPQ newsletter to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

See our newsletters

By signing up, you agree to our privacy policy and terms of use, and to receive messages from NPQ and our partners.

NPQ-Spring-2023-cover

Independent & in your mailbox.

Subscribe today and get a full year of NPQ for just $59.

subscribe
  • About
  • Contact
  • Advertise
  • Copyright
  • Careers

We are using cookies to give you the best experience on our website.

 

Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly
Powered by  GDPR Cookie Compliance
Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.