To understand the logic, consider whom a tap-in servesâand whom it doesn't.
Gibson says itâs for people facing charges such as drug possession, stealing, not paying child support, and most commonly, traffic violations. They miss court for all kinds of reasons. Some choose to skip because the alternative seemed worse (e.g., leaving babies at home; missing a shift and thereby losing a job). Others intended to appear but a family emergency arose, or the bus came late, or they fell ill. Gibson says that nearly half of participants report never receiving the mailed notice. That itself can result from a variety of circumstances: the courtâs sending the letter to a previous address, or an ever-evolving living situation.
After missing a hearing, though, many defendants donât realize that they can most likely show up to court and reschedule without consequenceâor they donât trust that to be the case. Observes Gibson: âA lot of people say, âThat sounds like a trap.â And the municipalities in St. Louis County are all disjointed with their own rules and procedures, so itâs hard to know what each municipality will do.â
The stakes are high, because although police officers arenât required to arrest people with âbench warrantsâ (which are issued for a failure to appear), many officers do make such arrestsâand being thrown in jail does a special kind of damage to those barely keeping their heads above water.
That damage became a hot topic after the Ferguson unrest and the court reforms that followedâand in fact, thatâs the context in which this policy arose. In 2016, St. Louis County received a grant from the MacArthur Foundation to reduce its jail population, and in 2020, tap-in became a part of that effort. Gibson, who was then an employee at the jail, was coordinating it; when she went to work for the county library, she took her coordinating duties with her. (It made sense, she says, to locate the center in the Florissant Valley Branch of SLCL because itâs a non-intimidating space.)
Using tap-in centers to avoid bench-warrant arrests doesnât merely help defendants, Gibson argues. It also relieves busy police officers, court clerks, and judges of the burden of dealing with them. âOverall,â Gibson says, âitâs a benefit to each part of the criminal-justice train.â
Evidently, that includes prosecutors. Jennifer Lorentz, who directs the diversion unit in the office of St. Louis Circuit Attorney Gabe Gore, says that when she pitched her boss on the idea, he quickly saw its benefitsâand not just for participants. âWe have witnesses and victims who donât want to testify,â Lorentz points out, âbecause they have warrants.â In February, the office began offering tap-in for misdemeanors and felonies. (Lorentz says it may be the only prosecutor-led tap-in center in the country.) So far, she says, most of the 179 people who have asked her team for help were city residents facing bench warrants in other jurisdictions, so the team referred them to the right place; itâs common for tap-in jurisdictions to cooperate in this way.
On a recent evening, two of Lorentzâs case managers and an attorney who handles misdemeanors were posted up in a meeting room on the second floor of downtownâs Central Library. The public defenderâs office was available remotely. Every Wednesday, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., people facing bench warrants can stroll in or even just make a phone call to access the entire group.
âIâve had a few of them cry,â said Sopheea Vomund, a case manager, âbecause they have so much going on and everythingâs spinning out of control.â Also on hand were two representatives of Mission: St. Louis, who can link up participants with wraparound services upon request.
Lorentz was present, too. Asked why tap-in centers donât incentivize blowing off court, she said that, for one thing, the people seeking help are trying to do the opposite: re-arrange a court date. But if they do show a history of missing court dates, prosecutors can oppose (or judges can deny) a motion to recall their bench warrants. Thatâs rare, however: According to Gibsonâs data, from September 2020 to December 2024, requests were granted in 84 percent of felony cases, 95 percent in misdemeanor cases, and 97 percent in ordinance violations.
âI donât know what the general populationâs opinion is of humans who have traffic warrants,â Lorentz said, âbut theyâre just good people who had things go wrong.â
No humans walked into the tap-in center that night. âVery typical,â said Lorentz, adding that the vast majority simply call in. âIf it were easy to get here,â she said, âit would be easy to get to court.â
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