'I was scared to death': Patients jailed over unpaid medical debt in rural Kansas
At a time when healthcare policy dominates national debate, a county in Kansas is jailing individuals with medical debt.Judge David Casement is a magistrate judge in Coffeyville, Kansas, where the poverty rate is twice the national average. He presides over cases in which individuals with medical debt are brought to court to face the medical companies they owe. During the hearings, the debtors must make a case for their own poverty during what is known as a “debtors exam.”