As Brookside continues fighting to prosecute people arrested or stopped by the town’s troubled police force, some drivers beat their criminal charges or took plea deals to resolve their cases.

But others, like Sandra Martin, remain in legal limbo in the town of roughly 1,200 just north of Birmingham.

After a Brookside officer arrested Martin in 2021, the town judge found her guilty of four misdemeanors. Then a state court judge threw out her charges on appeal last year, along with dozens of other cases from Brookside. After that, the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals reinstated Martin’s charges this spring. Now, she has to wait and see if the state Supreme Court will weigh in.

It all comes down to this question: Was Jefferson County Circuit Judge Shanta Craig Owens wrong to dismiss cases from Brookside without having a trial?

“Due to the lack of credibility and public trust of the Brookside Police Department under previous police leadership, all cases where the sole witness to the offense is a Brookside Police Officer will be met with heavy scrutiny by this Court,” Owens said in a March 2022 order.

Brookside appealed 33 cases against nine people to the Court of Criminal Appeals. So far, the appellate judges ruled in favor of Brookside in 29 cases against eight people, sending them back to state court for prosecution.

Bill Dawson, a Birmingham attorney representing Martin and other drivers arrested in Brookside, said Judge Owens was right to throw out the cases, as the charging documents weren’t properly signed. In Martin’s case, the officer identified himself only as “Agent JS” in court records.

“I believe that there was an absence of jurisdiction for Brookside to appeal and that the rulings of Judge Owens should stand,” Dawson told AL.com. “The unsworn and unsigned charges should have been dismissed by the court in Brookside. Judge Owens was correct and Brookside’s appeal should not have been allowed.”

The Brookside Police Department came under scrutiny after AL.com reported in January 2022 that the town used proceeds from nefarious traffic stops to increase revenue by 640 percent in two years. By 2020, fines and forfeitures came to account for nearly half of the town’s revenue. Those who were caught up in charges in Brookside said they faced intimidation, as police held them in a makeshift jail at town hall and the town court fined them hundreds or thousands of dollars.

The police chief who oversaw the department’s rapid growth from one officer to 14 resigned and left town, and half of the force quit or got forced out. The town judge has since been suspended from practicing law and no longer serves on the bench. Republicans and Democrats in the Alabama legislature passed new laws, including one that restricts towns from using fines and fees for more than 10 percent of their budgets.

But lawyers for Brookside continue to prosecute drivers who got caught up in the system.

So far, of the cases that have been sent back to Jefferson County Circuit Court, four of the defendants took plea deals, pleading guilty for just one or two charges and taking fines as low as $20 or as high as $300, plus court costs, in exchange for the rest of their charges being dismissed. One defendant is awaiting trial in November, while two others don’t yet have court dates.

The town of Brookside, represented by prosecutor Mark Parnell and attorney David Hubbard, declined to comment, citing the ongoing cases. But in an email to AL.com, Hubbard confirmed the town appealed 33 cases involving nine people who were arrested.

John Amari, a Trussville attorney representing two of those defendants, said he thinks having multiple hearings is a waste of taxpayer’s money.

“I think the sentiment was fair, because I don’t think that there was ever anything Brookside could do to convince her that things were on the up and up,” he said, of Judge Owens. “I guess the appellate court just didn’t agree with her.”

Amari said that some defendants who took plea deals, especially those who were paying for attorneys’ services, may have chosen to just plead guilty for one or two charges in exchange for not having to spend more money and time on the appeal process.

“You can kind of hedge your bets. ‘Maybe I did drive on a suspended license, maybe I did speed,’” he said. “The clients are the ones who get to make a decision.”