Richard, the "debtor's prison" comments in the articles about the practices have to do with filing charges against someone for a minor violation, i.e. jaywalking, and then, instead of having a civil fine structure in place for those who don't pay in time ($25 for 30 days late, etc), or give them the option of community service in lieu of a fine, those who don't pay are sent to jail.

In New York, if you have an outstanding violation, they don't look for you, they just get you when it comes time to renew your driver's license or other needed state issues. Even then they just mandate that you pay the fine before your license is renewed.

The jail for housing those who fail to pay their fines in Ferguson is of course not run by the municipality, but by a for-profit corporation who is paid X dollars/day per inmate.

I've dealt with PDs like this one, and the citizen winds up screwed regardless. Thankfully in the case of Nolanville, TX we had a commanding General on Ft. Hood who told the municipality to cut the BS or he was going to declare the town off-limits to all soldiers. There's no CG to do that for the residents of Ferguson. Nolanville made millions in fining soldiers on the highway to Ft. Hood which went through their town for about 2 miles. It's a great gig for a town, because soldiers are going to pay the fine, or they wind up with military charges against them in addition to the civil charges on the ticket. On that stretch of road, which was the sole 55 MPH limit for miles, if you were doing 56 MPH you were given a speeding ticket. If they were really low on revenue that week, if you were doing 53 MPH you were given a ticket for impeding the flow of traffic.

The way these cases read, it's an echo of warnings I have given people in the past: The bureaucracy is set up so that no matter what you do, by the time you finish your commute to work, you've violated at least 1 law. All you can do is hope that your particular violation doesn't become the point of emphasis on any given day.