Domres and Berth v. Jefferson County, Wisconsin
Equal Justice Under Law, in partnership with the Law Office of Mark G. Weinberg and the Law Office of Adele D. Nicholas, filed a federal class-action lawsuit against Jefferson County and the Jefferson County Sheriff for charging unconstitutional booking fees for alleged parole violations. The lawsuit alleges that the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office charges a mandatory booking fee to certain individuals booked into the jail. The fee is only charged to individuals who are arrested pursuant to an alleged parole violation, but is charged even when parole violations are based on technology malfunctions and is not refunded when those errors are corrected and the individuals are released. The fees are charged without any notice and without any adjudication of fault, and are not authorized by any statutes. Officials at the jail regularly seize the money off of the arrested individual if that individual has cash on their person at the time of arrest; otherwise, they collect the fee at a later time through billing and tax refund interception.
These booking fees are never court-ordered and are not approved by any judge. Due process prohibits a government from unilaterally extracting money without judicial adjudication of fault, a voluntary exchange, or a statutorily authorized tax on voluntary conduct. On top of this fatal flaw, the booking fee is unconstitutional because Jefferson County fails to provide reimbursement for the innocent, pre-deprivation process, post-deprivation process, or any rational basis for selectively charging parolees but not other arrestees.
Our lawsuit seeks class certification so that the case can proceed on behalf of all people who are unconstitutionally charged these arbitrary booking fees. Phil Telfeyan, Executive Director of Equal Justice Under Law, states “The Constitution carefully limits the government’s ability to forcibly extract money from its citizens—taxes, fees-for-services, and court ordered fines all include democratic protections. Jefferson County’s booking fees upend the very notion of fairness.” If successful, the lawsuit would prohibit Jefferson County from charging and collecting process-less booking fees.
Case Details
Status: Ongoing
Date Filed: January 22, 2026
Plaintiffs: Sara Domres and Randall Berth, individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated
Defendants: Jefferson County, Wisconsin, and Travis Maze in his official capacity as Jefferson County Sheriff
Jurisdiction: United States District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin
Partners: Law Office of Mark G. Weinberg, Law Office of Adele D. Nicholas
IMPACT
Case is ongoing.