The court should have ordered the seizure of bank assets to cover the debt. In no way should owning money ever result in jail time, fines, judgements or otherwise.
> He says seven deputy US Marshals showed up at his home with guns and took him to federal court where he had to sign a payment plan for the 29-year-old school loan.
He was not taken to prison, he was arrested. These are wildly different actions. Nowhere in the article do the strings "prison", "jail", "gaol", "cell", "penitentiary" or any other synonym for prison appear.
There is plenty of discussion elsewhere in the HN comments on what may have led to this arrest.
> Aker said he was put in the back of a truck and placed in a cell at the federal building in downtown Houston.
> Aker told The News that he was ordered to pay $5,700 for the loan, including interest. However, Aker was also ordered to pay for the cost of the morning arrest — nearly $1,300.
> If he didn't pay that amount by March 1, he said, he was told he would be arrested again.
Wonder what will happen when he's arrested again when he can't come up with $7000 in two weeks.
I have made no statement about the propriety of the actions described in either article, merely observed that this is not a case of sending someone to prison over a debt.
He was certainly compelled to appear in court (at what is probably a great waste of taxpayer resources), but after that appearance, I don't see where he would be detained if he didn't agree to pay the debt.
Where in the article did you see that "choice" presented? All that he was compelled to do was show up in court and agree to a payment plan. He might still never pay the debt.