Delinquent parents can be 'wanted'

• By SARAH CHACKO
• Advocate Capitol News Bureau
• Published: Jul 14, 2008 - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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The faces of parents “wanted” for past-due child support payments are being plastered throughout the state as enforcement officials try to recoup more than $700,000.

Eighteen parents owing between $11,000 and $116,000 are listed on this year’s “wanted” poster for skipping out on their court-ordered child-support payments.

The state is administering more than 290,000 child-support cases, said Robbie Endris, executive director of the Department of Social Services’ Support Enforcement Services Division. The child-support debt in Louisiana exceeds $1 billion, Endris said.

To land on the list, the noncustodial parent must owe more than $5,000, must not have made a payment for six months, their whereabouts are unknown, and all possible actions for enforcement have been taken.

For about 10 years, the division has been compiling the list, which is sent to district attorneys, courts and law-enforcement agencies all over Louisiana, Endris said. Now posted on the Internet, the list has been a helpful tool in bringing in parents trying to evade their obligation, Endris said.

“We have found probably a good number of them right here in our state,” Endris said.

Former New Orleans Saints player Rickey Jackson was on the list last year for owing about $160,000 in child support.

Endris said the state of Florida, where Jackson now resides, is moving forward with Louisiana’s case.

Two bills passed into law affect the penalties associated with owing child support and how long the state has to collect the past-due debt.

House Bill 84, sponsored by state Rep. Rosalind Jones, D-Monroe, adds a felony to the “Deadbeat Parents Punishment Act of Louisiana” for those owing more than $15,000 in child support for more than a year.

Existing law provided that only the second offense for failure to pay child support would be a felony.

By adding a felony for certain first offenders, law-enforcement officials can put the name of the person on the NCIC, a national list of wanted suspects, which can be accessed by police across the nation, Endris said.

Another measure passed into law gives the state more time to collect owed child support.