key: cord-0790266-3l1v46gm authors: Harper, Annie; Ginapp, Callie; Bardelli, Tommaso; Grimshaw, Alyssa; Justen, Marissa; Mohamedali, Alaa; Thomas, Isaiah; Puglisi, Lisa title: Debt, Incarceration, and Re-entry: a Scoping Review date: 2020-08-11 journal: Am J Crim Justice DOI: 10.1007/s12103-020-09559-9 sha: 2341d6fae1975290e2d5061f63ab22ac2b69f7f6 doc_id: 790266 cord_uid: 3l1v46gm People involved with the criminal justice system in the United States are disproportionately low-income and indebted. The experience of incarceration intensifies financial hardship, including through worsening debt. Little is known about how people who are incarcerated and their families are impacted by debt and how it affects their reentry experience. We conducted a scoping review to identify what is known about the debt burden on those who have been incarcerated and their families and how this impacts their lives. We searched 14 data bases from 1990 to 2019 for all original research addressing financial debt held by those incarcerated in the United States, and screened articles for relevance and extracted data from pertinent studies. These 31 studies selected for inclusion showed that this population is heavily burdened by debt that was accumulated in three general categories: debt directly from criminal justice involvement such as LFOs, preexisting debt that compounded during incarceration, and debts accrued during reentry for everyday survival. Debt was generally shown to have a negative effect on financial well-being, reentry, family structure, and mental health. Debts from LFOs and child support is very common among the justice-involved population and are largely unpayable. Other forms of debt likely to burden this population remain largely understudied. Extensive reform is necessary to lessen the burden of debt on the criminal justice population in order to improve reentry outcomes and quality of life. The United States incarcerates more people than any other country in the world; an estimated 3% of the total U.S. adult population and 15% of the African American adult male population will be incarcerated over their life course (Shannon et al., 2017) . Over 6 million people are under correctional supervision and over 600,000 people return to their communities from incarceration each year (Carson & Anderson, 2016; Kaeble & Glaze, 2016) . While incarcerated people are mostly men, the number of women incarcerated has grown faster than the overall incarceration growth rate (Swavola, Riley, & Subramanian, 2016) . Racial disparities are stark: African Americans make up less than 13% of the U.S. population but comprise over a third of all the people in prison (Western & Wildeman, 2009) . Incarceration contributes to deepening existing social and racial inequalities as people who have been incarcerated and their families face serious financial hardship in the form of housing and food insecurity, unemployment, exclusion from social programs after release, and a decreased ability to build or maintain wealth (Huebner, 2005; Maroto, 2015; Massoglia & Remster, 2019; Schwartz-Soicher, Geller, & Garfinkel, 2011; Turney & Schneider, 2016; Uggen, Manza, & Thompson, 2006; Western, Braga, Davis, & Sirois, 2015; Zaw, Hamilton, & Darity, 2016) . Debt may play a significant role in contributing to the financial hardship experienced by people who have been incarcerated. One form of debt they may be burdened by arises from the significant costs incurred as a direct result of criminal justice (CJ) system involvement (Beckett & Harris, 2011; Harris, Evans, & Beckett, 2010; Peterson, 2012) . These costs, which have risen in recent decades, include cash bail and "legal financial obligations" (LFOs), which include victim restitution, criminal fines and surcharges, court fees, incarceration charges, and fees for post-release supervision (Martin, Sykes, Shannon, Edwards, & Harris, 2018; Shafroth, 2018) . In addition, people who have been incarcerated, who are disproportionately low-income, may be burdened by other types of debts related to the growing gap between income and expenses (Atkinson, 2019; Zinman, 2015) . Although not directly related to criminal justice involvement, these debts may be intensified by the experience of arrest and incarceration. This scoping review was undertaken in order to map what is known about the burden of debt on people who have been incarcerated and their familiesdebt arising from both legal financial obligations (LFOs), and from other types of debt that arise before, during and after incarceration. The review has two aims: first, we identify gaps in the scholarly literature on debt and incarceration, suggesting future directions for research in the field; secondly, we contribute to the development of policies and programmatic efforts to lessen financial hardship among people who have been incarcerated, so reducing barriers to successful reentry. This review is part of a larger review process that was undertaken to understand the association between debt burden and health findings for this population. The incidence of LFOs has increased dramatically since the early 1980s, with the emergence of fines, fees and surcharges used to contain the financial costs of a growing criminal justice system, in the context of lower taxes and reduced government budgets (Appleman, 2016) . This tendency further accelerated following the 2008 recession (Fernandes et al. 2019) , despite evidence that using LFOs to fund local government and criminal justice systems is inefficient and ineffective (Menendez, Crowley, Eisen, & may compound their existing debt burden (Pettit & Western, 2004; Western & Pettit, 2010) . In addition to CJ related debts, the process of being arrested, sentenced and incarcerated may result in unpaid obligations such as rent, bills and existing consumer loans. Depending on the length of sentence, these debts await the person on their return to the community, or the debt burden may fall on family members (Allen, Kornya, & Taylor, 2017; Lewandoski, 2010) . Individuals and their families may also borrow to pay for in-prison costs such as commissary, medical care and phone calls, as well as costs associated with visiting incarcerated family members (Alabama Appleseed, 2018; duVuono-powell, Schweidler, Walters, & Zohrabi, 2015) . Women who are incarcerated are more likely to have been unemployed and/or receive public assistance prior to incarceration and, therefore, to struggle to manage expenses (Swavola et al., 2016) . Child support obligations of people who have been incarcerated are known to create barriers to employment and ability to meet basic needs or provide for family members, and can result in strained family relationships and higher recidivism rates (Cammet, 2006; Cancian, Meyer, & R., 2018; Holzer, Offner, & Sorensen, 2005; McLeod & Gottlieb, 2018; Smoyer, Blankenship, & Macintosh, 2009; Zatz, 2016) . After release, debts may be incurred to cover costs related to community supervision, drug testing and mandatory treatment costs, as well as general living expenses, particularly given difficulties finding employment (Keene, Rosenberg, Schlesinger, Guo, & Blankenship, 2018; Subramanian, 2015) . While considerable research explores the extent and social consequences of LFOs and resulting debt, little is known about how those specific debts intersect with the myriad other types of debt that people have, or how those intersecting debts impact the lives of previously incarcerated people and their families. It is critical to properly understand this complex web of debts in order to be able to develop policies and programs to alleviate the debt burden. This scoping review seeks to identify what the existing literature tells us about all debt types impacting people returning from incarceration. The following questions guided this scoping review: 1. What types of debt do people who have been incarcerated have? 2. What is the impact of that debt on their lives? We use the PRISMA Extension for Scoping Reviews and Levac et al's recommendations for scoping review methodology (Levac, Colquhoun, & O'Brien, 2010; Tricco et al., 2018) to guide the methodology for the review. We included studies that provided primary data on debt accrued by people currently or formerly incarcerated in the United States or their families. Incarceration was defined as confinement to jail or prison for any reason. Debt was defined as any money which was owed during or after release from incarceration, including legal financial obligations (LFOs), unpaid bills, formal debts such as credit card debt, child support, AFS debt such as payday loan debt, and money borrowed from support networks. We included peer-reviewed publications in addition to reports self-published outside of peer reviewed journals by independent research institutions as well as dissertations or theses. We included only studies published after 1990, with the aim of focusing on the impact of the significant rise in LFO costs since the 1980s, and the parallel rise in the burden of debt on low income families since that same period (Harris et al., 2010; Zinman, 2015) . We included studies that used a variety of research methods, including quantitative, mixed methods and qualitative studies. We excluded studies not written in English and studies where the study population was incarcerated outside of the United States, as the extent of mass incarceration and lack of support systems available to the poor in the United States prevent generalization of data from other countries. The search strategies were developed by a clinical librarian and were peer-reviewed using Peer Review of Electronic Search Strategies (PRESS) (McGowan et al., 2016) . The search included a mixture of keywords and controlled vocabulary about justice involved persons and debt. For the full search strategy see Appendix. The following databases were searched from 1990 to 2019 to identify potentially relevant studies: Business Source Premier, Criminal Justices Abstracts, EconLit, Google Scholar, JSTOR, National Criminal Justice Reference Service, Ovid Embase, Ovid Medline, Ovid PsychInfo, PAIS Index, Pubmed, Scopus, Sociological Abstracts, and Web of Science Core Collection. The final search was performed on July 8, 2019 and resulted in 8327 citations. All citations were downloaded into Endnote ×9, where 1620 duplicate citations were removed. The remaining 6707 citations were uploaded into Covidence for screening. One additional article was located outside of the original search from handsearching the bibliographies of included studies and was added to Covidence. The total number of articles screened in Covidence was 6708. We performed all study screening on Covidence, in a two-staged process using a team of four reviewers. During the first stage, we reviewed the titles and abstracts of all 6708 studies to assess them for meeting inclusion and exclusion criteria; the work was divided such that each study was independently reviewed by two reviewers, and any discrepancies were resolved by a third reviewer. The team of reviewers met before screening was initiated to develop a standardized study inclusion form, and also met periodically during the screening process to discuss and resolve any concerns. The form was iteratively updated throughout the first stage of the screening process to refine the criteria for inclusion, based on abstracts that presented uncertainty. A total of 456 articles were selected for full-text screening during this first phase. During the second phase of screening, we reviewed the full text of all studies that were included in the first phase; each text was reviewed by two reviewers independently, and any discrepancies between the two reviewers were resolved by full group discussion. A total of 31 studies were selected for inclusion in the review during the second stage. After we finalized the list of 31 studies that met inclusion criteria, we extracted relevant data from full text articles using a Qualtrics questionnaire. The questionnaire was developed by four authors to analyze studies for relevance and extract relevant variables. Each study was charted by two reviewers independently, one of whom then reviewed the charting to note any discrepancies. For studies with a qualitative component, we captured relevant findings in brief summaries; each of the two reviewers prepared a summary and then one reviewer combined the two summaries into a single summary to ensure all aspects were covered. Any discrepancies in charting were resolved through discussion between the two reviewers who had charted the paper. The team met regularly to discuss the process and address any concerns or resolve any persistent discrepancies. The data abstracted from all articles included general study characteristics and methodology, study participant characteristics (sample size, demographics, incarceration history), amount and kind of debt owed, and any health information collected. Data on health-related findings will be published separately. Data from Qualtrics was exported to Google Sheets and descriptive statistics were performed using Microsoft Excel. The 31 articles included in the data analysis were published between 1997 and 2019. Over half were journal articles, a quarter institutional reports, and the remainder dissertations/theses or working papers (Table 1) . Methodology was split nearly evenly between quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods, and studies were completed across many geographic regions in the United States. The specific populations studied varied from people currently incarcerated, to people on parole or probation after incarceration, and included people who had been incarcerated at some point in the past without details about their probation or parole status. Six studies included participants specifically on probation or parole. Some of the studies focused on currently or previously incarcerated people with specific characteristics; parents of minors, men owing child support, or people who had been jailed for unpaid fines. Eight studies specifically focused on those with criminal justice or child support debt, one of which only included people in jail for unpaid fines. Most studies included participants of all genders, though the predominance of participants were male. Eight studies included only men and four studies included only women. Nine studies analyzed and reported on data taken from existing large-scale databases or court or Department of Corrections (DOC) records, seven used data from both surveys and/or interviews with the target population and data from existing databases/ records, and fourteen used data from surveys and/or interviews only. Two used ethnographic methods, one in conjunction with in-person interviews. a Access to credit indicates both existing debt problems (unpaid debts lower credit scores which lowers credit access) and future possible debt, as people with bad credit have to rely on more costly debt types Some studies reported on all types of debt, but most focused only on one type. Many of the studies reported on debt in non-standardized ways; some detailed different types of debt, others were less specific in their reporting of debt. Some studies did not clearly differentiate between ongoing financial obligations such as bills that people were paying on time, and actual debtmeaning payments that had fallen behind. We endeavored to report only on the latter. The debts most commonly reported related to LFOs or child support. LFO debt was included in 19 studies; LFO debt from supervision fees (i.e. those incurred for the costs of mandated programs while on probation or parole) was the mostly commonly reported type (Table 2) . Child support was covered in 14 studies. Total debt, unpaid bills, predatory lender debts, debt to social networks, medical debt, and access to credit after incarceration were found in two to three studies each. Most studies focused on only one of the above categories of indebtedness: eight considered LFOs together with other types of debts burdening low-income households, or LFO impact on credit (Table 3) . LFO Debt Studies of all types found that between 50 and 90% of people with LFOs are in arrears (Arditti & Few, 2006; Diller, Greene, & Jacob, 2009; Harris et al., 2010; Link, 2019; Nagrecha, Katzenstein, & Davis, 2015; Pleggenkuhle, 2018) , other than one mixed methods study which found that only 20% have LFO and/or child support debt (La Vigne, Visher, & Castro, 2004) . African-Americans are more likely to owe LFO debt (Link, 2019) . LFO debt is most often reported as arising from post-release supervision fees including half-way housing rent (Diller et al., 2009; Johnson, 2015; Link, 2019; Ortiz & Jackey, 2019) . LFO debts can cause long term debt and damaged credit (Harris et al., 2010; Pleggenkuhle, 2018) , with one study reporting 75% sent to collections; African-Americans are more likely to have their debt sent to collections (Diller et al., 2009) . Mixed and qualitative studies explore how people who owe LFO debts rely on social networks for financial support which causes family strain (Cook, Johnson, 2015; Nagrecha et al., 2015; Pleggenkuhle, 2012; Pogrebin, West-Smith, Walker, & Unnithan, 2014) , forgo basic necessitates to make payments (Cook, 2014; Harris, 2016) , face difficulties finding housing (Harris et al., 2010; Mogk, Shmigol, Futrell, Stover, & Hagopian, 2019) , and are discouraged from entering formal economy or are forced to work low-wage jobs and forgo career-enhancing training/ education (Harris et al., 2010; Ortiz & Jackey, 2019; Pleggenkuhle, 2018) . Various studies using different methods found that LFO debt may cause recidivism due to illegal activity or incarceration due to non-payment; two mixed methods studies found the latter happen in 17%-20% of cases (Cook, 2014; Ortiz, 2010; Ortiz & Jackey, 2019; Tostlebe, 2017) . Numbers of people owing restitution varied from 13 to 70% (Koenig, 2007; Pearson & Davis, 2003; Pleggenkuhle, 2012) ; restitution debt may, in contrast to other LFO debt, increased time to recidivism (Tostlebe, 2017) . Two studies examined bail; a large quantitative study found that those who cannot afford bail face a 41% increase in court fees which may result in increased court fee debt (Stevenson, 2018) . Debt from LFOs, including bail, results in individuals and their familiesparticularly female family members -borrowing from costly, predatory lenders (Cook, 2014; Page et al., 2019) , cutting back on essentials and falling behind on bills (Cook, 2014; Harris et al., 2010; Richards & Jones, 1997) . LFO debt is associated with negative mental health including stress, a sense of hopelessness, feeling overwhelmed, and substance use (Arditti & Few, 2006; Cook, 2014; Harris, 2016; Pleggenkuhle, 2018) . Child Support Debt Studies of all types found that between 66%-92% of people who have been incarcerated have child support debt (Nagrecha et al., 2015; Pearson & Davis, 2003; Pleggenkuhle, 2018; Roman & Link, 2015) . This is twice the rate of child support debt among people with child support orders who have not been incarcerated (McLeod & Gottlieb, 2018; Thoennes, 2002) . Having low income and being non-white is associated with higher levels of child support debt (McLeod & Gottlieb, 2018) . There is no strong quantitative evidence that child support debt increases recidivism due to illegal activities Roman & Link, 2015) , though it can result in incarceration due to non-payment (Haney, 2018) . A quantitative study found that people owing child support debt are 6% less likely to have legitimate employment after release from incarceration; poor employment outcomes are associated with worse health . Qualitative studies suggest that child support debt can lead to exclusion from the formal economy (Haney, 2018) , unpaid bills (Richards & Jones, 1997) , revocation of driver's license and passport (Haney, 2018) and reliance on social networks, particularly family, for financial support, which causes relationship strain and economic hardship (Haney, 2018; Nagrecha et al., 2015; Pogrebin et al., 2014) . Child support debt also results in wage garnishing and loss of tax refunds (Haney, 2018) . Child support debt can be lessened through various mechanisms; freezing payments during incarceration results in higher payment rates post release (Noyes, 2013) , and employment support post-release through drug court or other reentry programs as much as doubles the payment rate (Logan et al., 2004; Pearson & Davis, 2003) . Other Types of Debt People who owe LFO and child support debt also have unpaid bills, borrow from social networks (Cook, 2014; Page et al., 2019; Richards & Jones, 1997) and have damaged credit which limits access to affordable, asset-building loans and increases use of predatory lenders; one study found that people who had been incarcerated are 2-4 times more likely to use such lenders (Diller et al., 2009; Glidden & Brown, 2017; Harris, 2016) . In-prison costs including healthcare fees may result in stressful borrowing from other incarcerated people and social networks, particularly by incarcerated women who have higher rates of health problems than incarcerated men (Harner, Wyant, & Da Silva, 2017) . A large quantitative study found that people who have been incarcerated have a 69% drop in credit scores, resulting both from pre and post-incarceration debts, which impacts access to housing, employment and financial products, and increases likelihood of recidivism by 15-20% (Aneja & Avenancio-Leon, 2019) . Four mixed methods or qualitative studies explored other types of debts owed, including medical debt (Koenig, 2007; Ortiz, 2010; Pleggenkuhle, 2012) and debt related to traffic ticket fines and license suspension (Nagrecha et al., 2015; Ortiz, 2010 ). Differences between policies in different jurisdictions, and different approaches to the research, make it difficult to draw generalized conclusions, but our review finds that people who have been incarcerated are significantly burdened by multiple types of debt, with a disproportionate burden on African Americans. Most of the studies in this review examine LFO debt and find that the majority of people who are assessed LFOs fall into arrears on those obligations. As they struggle to pay their LFOs, people experience economic hardship and financial strain, face challenges in finding employment and housing after release, are burdened by ongoing, long-term indebtedness, and their family networks are also burdened, which causes tension in relationships. LFOs contribute to a cycle of indebtedness, constrained decisions and stress, which may impact the risk of recidivism in the future, and certainly contributes to deepening impoverishment. Regarding non-LFO debt, most studies focus on child support debt, which, similar to LFO debt, can hinder efforts to find employment and rebuild financial security and social networks. Other types of non-LFO debt include bills and fines owed prior to incarceration that go unpaid, including utility and medical bills and traffic fines, debts incurred to friends and family related to the costs of arrest, incarceration and postrelease demands, and debts arising from predatory loans taken post-release. People become entangled in a web of overlapping debts, taking new debt to pay off older debts, including LFO debt, relying on social networks where possible, or resorting to costly, predatory debt given damaged credit. The prevalence of both LFO and non-LFO debt among people reentering the community after incarceration, and the extent to which that debt hinders efforts to rebuild both a financial future and social relationships, suggests a significant impact of debt on successful reentry. The disproportionate burden of this debt on people of color layers on an already enormous racial wealth gap; Black people have only 10% and Latinx people only 12% of the wealth of white people (Hamilton, Nieves, Markoff, & Newville, 2020) , and are more likely to be burdened by medical or predatory debt, and to be in default on other types of debt (Charron-Chénier & Seamster, 2020; Seamster, 2019) . Women may be uniquely impacted by this web of debt related to incarceration, both women who provide financial support to their loved ones in prison or after release, and those who have been incarcerated; women hold more student debt (Miller, 2017) may be more negatively impacted by medical debt (Choi, 2018) , are more likely to be behind on other types of debt and have worse credit scores (Geng, 2018; Mottola, 2013) and may face legal costs associated with regaining custody of children. This scoping review poses implications for policies and programs related to criminal justice and re-entry processes. Given the negative impacts of LFO and other debt, there is a need for well researched policies and programs to reduce the debt incurred by CJ involved people and enable them to better manage debt they do have. Cash bail and LFOs should be eliminated or sliding scale approaches to assessing fines and fees implemented (ACLU, 2013; Diller et al., 2009; Harris, 2016; Link, 2019; Mogk et al., 2019; Pogrebin et al., 2014; Stevenson, 2018) , and in-prison medical costs eliminated (Haney, 2018) . For example, in California, after the publication of a 2017 report on fee practices in juvenile courts all juvenile fees were abolished (Campos-Bui, Selbin, Jaka, Kline, & Phillips, 2017). Particular attention should be paid to LFOs incurred after incarceration, given that these were the LFO types most commonly reported as leading to debt. Child support policies must be reformed, including implementing automatic freezing of obligations during incarceration and integrating payment assistance into reentry programs including employment support (Logan et al., 2004; Nagrecha et al., 2015; Noyes, 2013; Pearson & Davis, 2003; Thoennes, 2002) . Reforms are needed in the area of debt collection practices for all types of debt. For example, New York, Maryland, and North Carolina have implemented reforms requiring sufficient verification that a debt is legitimately owed before a collection suit can be filed (The Aspen Institute, 2018). Debt-encumbered individuals need improved access to legal services so they can invoke their legal protections regarding debt. For example, a 2016 report from Connecticut identified specific legislative recommendations that could improve low-income people's access to justice related to debt, including funding for lawyers, improved computer access to provide self-help resources, enabling non-lawyer personnel to assist in eviction defense and consumer debt cases, and several other provisions (Clendenen & Fisher, 2016) . Programs that help people find employment after release are helpful, though time must be provided for career-building training and education . Reforms addressing employment discrimination against people with records are also important, while recognizing the risk of resulting increased racial discrimination (Agan & Starr, 2018) . Individuals should be provided financial guidance both as they enter the criminal justice system, and as they reenter the community after incarceration, to help them minimize the impact of incarceration on their debt and credit (Glidden & Brown, 2017; Ortiz, 2010) . Financial literacy education may be helpful, as well as changes to banking practice and policies (Koenig, 2007; Mielitz, Clady, Lurtz, & Archuleta, 2019; Mielitz & Marcum, 2020) . Structural reform is needed to address deep-rooted poverty and inequality, such as Baby Bondstrust funds set up for all children, the amount depending on the child's family's existing wealth (Hamilton et al., 2020; Hamilton & Darity, 2010 ) -public provision of healthcare, housing and education (Baradaran, 2019; Galvani, Parpia, Foster, Singer, & Fitzpatrick, 2020) , and access to good jobs with living wages and decent benefits (Paul, Darity, Hamilton, & Zaw, 2018) . More research is needed to better understand the mechanisms of the connection between debt and re-entry difficulties such as recidivism, unemployment and social network relationships (Harris, 2016; McLeod & Gottlieb, 2018; Pleggenkuhle, 2018; Roman & Link, 2015; Tostlebe, 2017) . It is important to understand more about how LFOs interact with and compound existing social disadvantage (Harris, 2016) , including debts not associated with LFOs or child support. Most research to date on the debt of people who have been incarcerated focuses on LFOrelated debt; the only non-LFO debt that is well-studied is child support. While there is some research on the interplay between LFO and other types of debt, further research should explore the totality of debt people face after they have been incarcerated, and how those different types of debt impact their successful reentry. More broadly, these findings suggest the need for further research to explore the entanglements of mass incarceration with deregulated financial and credit services available to poor people. Lastly, future research should use rigorous methods and standardized tools to create more generalizable results, allowing for national level policy responses. Additionally, there is a need to increase the extent to which the perspectives of CJ involved people are included in research (Harner et al., 2017) . Because there is no standardized way to report on criminal justice involvement or debt, the search criteria was broad and non-specific. It is possible that some studies were missed in the search. Another limitation of this scoping review was the fact that the debt that people who have been incarcerated have varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, making it difficult to generalize across studies. Also, the studies used a range of different approaches, measuring debt in different ways, adding to the difficulty of drawing general conclusions. Finally, we only considered studies about people who were or had been incarcerated; the burden of LFO and non-LFO debt on those involved in the criminal justice system who are not actually incarcerated, particularly those on probation, is also likely to be significant. Debt from legal financial obligations and child support are very common among people who have been incarcerated and these debts are largely unpayable. Other forms of debt likely to burden this population remain largely understudied. There is considerable accumulated evidence that the burden of debt on people who have been incarcerated is rising and causes significant barriers to successful reentry back into the community life. or economic or monetary or cost) adj3 (hardship* or burden* or sanction* or distress* or toxicity or problem* or obligation* or delinquen* or trouble* or issue* or difficulties or crisis or crises or problem* or stress* or insecurit* or downturn or downturns or strain* or instability)).tw,kw or monies or cash or income) adj3 (trouble* or issue* or difficulties or crisis or crises or problem* or stress* or hardship* or insecurity or obligation* or delinquen* or strain*or instability)).tw,kw credit* or loan* or borrow* or owe* or arrears or lend*).tw,kw. 10. child* support.tw,kw or late or statutor* or collection*) adj3 (fine* or fee* or payment*)).tw,kw. 12. restitution*.tw,kw (bank or banks or bankruptcy or bankruptcies).tw,kw. 16. garnish* wage*.tw,kw. 17. pawn shop*.tw,kw. 18. money order*.tw,kw. 19. alternative check cashing.tw,kw. 20. rent to own store*.tw,kw. 21. 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The content of this work is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the policy or views of the Veterans Health Administration. The data is available on the Open Science Framework at this link.Code Availability (Software Application or Custom Code) Not applicable. Authors' Contributions AH, CG and LP had the idea for the article, AH, CG, AG, MJ, AM, and IT contributed to the literature search and data analysis and AH, CG, TB and LP contributed to the writing of the manuscript. Conflicts of Interest/Competing Interests (Include Appropriate Disclosures) There are no conflicts of interest or competing interests. Search for Ovid Embase.Additional database searches provided upon request: Alyssa.grimshaw@yale.edu 1. prisons/ or prisoners/ or exp criminals/ 2. (incarcerat* or criminal justice system or prison* or jail* or court* or correctional or inmate* or convict* or offender* or detained or detainee or imprison* or behind bars or penitentiary* or detention*).tw,kw. 3. (parol* or probation*).tw,kw. 4. (justice-involve* or justice involve*or ex-con* or felon* or ex-offender*).tw,kw.