Evanston homeowner avoids jail but now owes nearly $900 in court fines, fees

An Evanston homeowner who faced jail time because of building code violations said he has made enough improvements to his property to resolve his case with the city of Cincinnati. That’s the good news for Earl Starr. The bad news is that he still owes more than $800 from all the fees and fines that stacked up because of the time he spent in court. “My probation officer said, ‘If you’ve got 479, we can dismiss this,’” Starr said. “I said, ‘I hope you mean four dollars and 79 cents.’” No such luck. Starr owes a total of $856 in court costs, fines, a supervision fee that must be paid to Hamilton County Adult Probation and a $2 per day charge for the electronic-monitoring device that he was sentenced to wear for 90 days because of the building code violations, said Jerry Campbell, assistant chief probation officer for municipal court.