CLEVELAND (WJW) — The Fox 8 I-Team has found officials at the Ohio Attorney General’s office just stopped a big push from Cleveland Municipal Clerk of Court’s Office to collect really old parking fines.

Weeks ago we revealed the municipal clerk of court’s plan to collect fines for tickets 20 years old. Court officials sent 100,000 old parking tickets to the attorney general’s office for collection.

The majority of the fines were under $100, which violated a Memorandum of Understanding signed between the attorney general’s office and the court. The Memorandum of Understanding states all fines sent for collection would be $100 or more.

The letter sent to the court on April 24 by Lucas Ward, Section Chief of Collections Enforcement for the Ohio Attorney General’s office, states the program was canceled, “In light of your failure to abide by the terms. This cancellation is effective immediately.”

“Cleveland Municipal Clerk of Courts shall be responsible for handling any refunds that you determine are due to the individuals who have paid on these accounts,” the letter states. “It is your mistake, so it must be your cure,” Ward said.

Obie Shelton, Director of Communications for Cleveland Municipal Clerk’s Office, says court officials were trying to collect parking fines from 100,000 drivers. The unpaid tickets were from 2000 to 2005. He said he understands why the program was canceled.

“We knew it was the result of an oversight from the office,” Shelton said.

The clerk’s office told the I-Team previously they spent years setting up the collections program. So, we asked how it got messed up.

“Certainly looking at how that happened,” Shelton said. “And we are putting in systems so that it doesn’t happen again”

Shelton, however, said if you paid a  ticket already, do not expect a refund.  He said most drivers simply ended up paying tickets they owed.

Shelton said the office will only refund someone’s money if they can prove they don’t owe the money.

“There have been a few people who’ve been able to show there was a glitch in the records or maybe a character was off on their license plate,” Shelton said.

Malia Nesbitt said she paid $33 for a parking ticket she doesn’t even remember getting and is glad the program is being canceled.

“We didn’t know we owed the bill we didn’t even remember the car we were driving back then,” Nesbitt said. “It took us four hours to figure it out on the phone. That’s kinda sad, honestly that they weren’t more together on this.”