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Kenton McGaughy visits with his granddaughter Jaziyah McDonald, 2, Thursday afternoon. Mr. McGaughy is trying to pay off his unpaid child support after serving time in prison.

Feeding his crack habit in a known drug house when law officers kicked in the door about two years ago, Kenton McGaughy was swooped up, convicted of possession and sent to prison. He was paroled in March.

Today, he’s escaped the cold walls of a state penitentiary, but there is no escape from paying child support — of which owes more than $27,000. He’s paying it down with a $9-an-hour job as a short-order cook.

Re-entry officials say ex-convicts like Mr. McGaughy emerge from prison facing menial employment, lowered earning power and a policy that may whisk them back to prison for debts built while behind bars. That contrasts with a tough prosecutor in St. Joseph who is unapologetic about recovering child support.

Mr. McGaughy, 46, says he has begun to turn around his life after what he calls a revolving door of prison, an outside world of drugs and alcohol and continually falling behind on his child support payments. He lives in a shelter among homeless to make ends meet. Almost half of his $680 biweekly paycheck goes toward support of his two children and payment to their mothers on arrearages.

“It’s a humbling process. I can’t get ahead with the way the economy is,” he said. “Gotta keep working, man, to keep them off my back.”

Buchanan County Prosecutor Dwight Scroggins is among officials who consider child support a serious enforcement issue and a prison sentence as “voluntary unemployment.” Warrants requested by his office brought Mr. McGaughy from Colorado three times for nonsupport.

“If you are a criminal, you’ve chosen to do time. You should support the child immediately on getting out. That should be your No. 1 priority. And if it’s not, your thinking is still not very straight,” Mr. Scroggins said.

But finding a job upon release, getting substance abuse treatment and making up lost time with family are factors that affect a newly released inmate, said Marcia Miller, a former corrections employee who heads an inmate support program in St. Joseph.

She advocates up to three months before repayment on child support begins, and for it not to be based on the inmate’s earning potential before prison.

“They all want to pay. They want their children taken care of. But they get discouraged when they can’t pay what they’re required to pay, or they’re paying but they still continue to accumulate a lot of back child support,” said Ms. Miller, a supervisor at Catholic Charities’ Turn Around program.

She’s said without concessions, inmates default to crime and continue a cycle of incarceration and

poverty.

Last year, unpaid child support obligations ranked 19th among offenses that land an ex-convict back in prison, according to the Missouri Department of Corrections.

Mr. Scroggins says a person who is back on child support typically gets 10 to 12 chances to pay up before serving any time.

“Most people that I know, if you ask them what percent of their check goes toward supporting their children, they will tell you it’s 100 percent. These people are complaining about 50 percent,” Mr. Scroggins said.

Ahmad Safi can be reached at ahmadsafi@npgco.com.