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Athens County Prosecutor’s Office Has More Jail Restitution Money
By: Steffany Hiett
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The Athens County Prosecutor's Office has collected more jail restitution money in the last month than in the past year.
Prosecutor Keller Blackburn says the reason for this increase is he has now made it a priority to make inmates pay for their own incarceration.
"We spent about thirty percent of the county's general fund on law enforcement, being the Sheriff's budget, my budget and the regional jail," Blackburn says. "One point four million of it being the regional jail is a large burden for tax payers. In certain cases in the past people have paid, but it hasn't been a large priority."
The office collected nearly 24 thousand dollars for the month of January, surpassing the yearly amount collected in 2011 of nearly 21 thousand dollars.