By Mike Cason
The Alabama House of Representatives passed a bill tonight to make it a crime to misrepresent the boundaries of a municipality’s police jurisdiction, such as by moving signs or markers.
Rep. Juandalynn Givan, D-Birmingham, brought the bill after reports of police abuses in Brookside, a town of about 1,200 people in her Jefferson County district that raised its revenues from fines and forfeitures by more than 600% between 2018 and 2020.
Among the complaints from people who had encounters with Brookside police are that they were pulled over and charged outside the town’s jurisdiction. Givan said that is also happening in other towns.
Givan’s bill would make intentional misrepresentation of jurisdictional boundaries a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail and a fine of up to $6,000.
Givan’s bill passed by a vote of 95-3. It moves to the Senate.
