Request By:
Hon. Michael G. Reilly
Sheriff of Hickman County
Courthouse
Hickman, Kentucky 42031
Opinion
Opinion By: Frederic J. Cowan, Attorney General; Gerard R. Gerhard, Assistant Attorney General
Re: Whether Person Convicted of Drug or Alcohol Offense can be Ordered by Court to Make Donation to Sheriff's Drug and Alcohol Fund. AGO Corr. No. 91-(o)-1677.
By letter of October 22, 1991, you ask whether the District Court may order a person convicted of drug or alcohol offense to make a donation to a drug and alcohol fund maintained by your office.
Because no statute authorizes a court to order one convicted of a crime to make a donation to a sheriff's drug and alcohol fund (or similar public purpose fund), we believe the district court would have no authority to enter such an order. Discussion follows.
Penalties that can be imposed upon one convicted of a crime are statutory in nature. While we do not know each charge that might be treated as a "drug or alcohol offense" for purposes of the donations you contemplate, we find no statute authorizing a district court to order donations to a public purpose fund or program of the nature you have asked about, as a post conviction remedy. Accordingly, we do not believe such can be lawfully ordered.
Although perhaps some charges you are concerned with are outside the penal code, presumably most convictions will be under that code. KRS 532.030 establishes authorized dispositions upon conviction under the penal code. A donation to a public purpose fund, e.g., a sheriff's drug and alcohol fund, is not among the dispositions authorized by such provision, or those to which it refers, e.g., KRS Chapter 534. Compare also, KRS 533.070, which allows a court, as a form of conditional discharge, to order one convicted of a crime to work at community service related projects. While the legislature has given the courts some latitude concerning what might be called post conviction remedies (see KRS 533.030 regarding restitution and 533.070, above), it has not authorized a court to order a donation of the nature you have asked about, and therefore such cannot be lawfully done.
And see, OAG 79-354 (copy enclosed), indicating that while a court might impose reasonable conditions in connection with probating one convicted of violation of an ordinance, it cannot impose additional requirements and restrictions outside prescribed penalty limits.