By Heather Harris, with research support from Thomas Sloan

Adopting untested policies helped California courts resolve criminal charges safely amid a public health crisis. Of the main policies, only remote hearings have endured—and their future is uncertain. Assembly Bill 199 allows California courts to conduct most criminal hearings remotely only through 2023.

This report chronicles how the COVID-19 pandemic affected the courts in 2020, describes policy responses, and assesses the impact of remote hearing policies on conviction and sentencing outcomes within six months of arrest.

Pandemic conditions challenged the courts’ capacity to resolve cases. An estimated 55,000 criminal cases that would have completed within six months remained unresolved at the end of 2020.→

Courts acted swiftly to adapt to pandemic conditions. Three main strategies included modifying pretrial release to reduce jail populations, permitting remote hearings, and extending case timelines.→

Uneven adoption of policies, coupled with geographic differences in where people live, meant that Black and Latino defendants had greater potential than people of other races to experience pandemic policies.→

Remote hearing policies reinforced pandemic trends for lower conviction rates, but counteracted trends in sentencing. When remote hearing policies were in place, rates of conviction within six months of arrest fell, with outcomes for white, Latino, and Black people driving this result. Misdemeanor convictions were less likely to lead to jail and more likely to receive noncustodial sentences such as probation and money sanctions, mainly for white, Latino, and Black people. Felony convictions were less likely to result in prison and more likely to lead to jail, and outcomes for Black people dominated this result.→

Remote hearing policies contributed to racial differences in criminal case outcomes. Inequity in conviction and jail sentence rates narrowed between white and Latino defendants and between white and Black defendants. By contrast, racial inequity widened in the likelihood of being sentenced to money sanctions and probation.→

Arguably, whether a criminal proceeding is conducted virtually or in person should not influence whether a person is convicted or how they are sentenced; yet remote hearing policies have affected both. Before Assembly Bill 199 expires, policymakers will need to determine whether these outcomes are desirable and how to factor them into decisions about whether to allow criminal cases to proceed remotely.

San Francisco: Public Policy Institute of California, 2023.

By Malcolm M. Feeley

n his important article, Criminal Justice, Inc., Professor John Rappaport identifies the establishment of a new and novel institution: a private company retained by retail stores to dispose of cases involving shoplifting claims. Still in its infancy, this new development has spawned two private for-profit, specialist companies since 2010: the Corrective Education Company (CEC) and Turning Point Justice CEC alone handles thousands of shoplifting cases annually,

and if some legal technicalities are overcome, these companies may be handling signifi­cantly more in the coming years.

Both companies have the same business model, which Rappaport calls “Criminal Justice, Inc.” (CJ Inc.): Store security guards apprehend shoplifters, but instead of handling matters themselves or calling the police, the guards determine program eligibility according to strictly defined criteria and inform those eligible that they will be contacted by representatives of the CJ Inc. companies.In the subsequent call, CJ Inc. promises that the store will not call the police in exchange for a “tuition” payment to enroll in an online class on how to avoid crime.

Retailers, which include large national chains with aggregate annual sales in the billions of dollars, pay nothing for this service.

This new development, Rappaport tells us, may transform the way shoplifting is handled. In this Response, I place CJ Inc. in a broader context, point to other similar developments earlier and elsewhere, and imagine the future of criminal adjudication in a world of “CJ Incs.” After highlighting Rappaport’s central findings, I examine the model from two perspectives. First, I consider CJ Inc. from a historical and comparative perspective to show it is not so new: This sort of self-help is a time-honored practice found across all stratified societies. Second, I explore this phenomenon in light of practices common in many segmented socie­ties. Here, too, there is a substantial body of research on legal plu­ralism, which shows that alternatives to govern­mental systems of social control are common, even in criminal law matters, and even in modern societies. The introduction of CJ Inc. into contemporary American stores is one more instance of creative adap­tation within segmented institu­tions. The examination of social control in stratified and segmented societies reveals a great deal about the nature and the limits of the crimi­nal law, the limits of the state’s ostensible monopoly on the enforcement of criminal law, and the possible future of CJ Inc. and other related developments.

In this Response, I show that Rappaport has identified some­thing of a paradigm case in the amalgamation of stratified and seg­mented struc­tures that facilitate opportunities for expanded forms of private criminal justice administration. If I am correct, the implications for the expansion of CJ Inc. are enormous. Part I examines the social dimension of shoplift­ing and provides a thumbnail sketch of retail jus­tice. Part II examines self-help in stratified and segmented societies and explores the implica­tions of treating department stores as both stratified and seg­mented institutions. Part III identifies other stratified or segmented set­tings and explores the nature of existing CJ Inc.-like institutions and others that may emerge. The list is long, suggesting that CJ Inc. has a bright future. The conclusion addresses some implications stemming from the likely development of CJ Inc., especially as it affects both public law enforce­ment and the expansion of private adjudication in criminal law.

Columbia Law Review Online, Vol. 119, March 2019

By Anna VanCleave

The death penalty has gained its legitimacy from the belief that capital prosecutions are more procedurally rigorous than noncapi-tal prosecutions. This Article reveals how a project of heightened capital standards, set in motion when the Supreme Court ended and then revived the death penalty, was set up to fail.

In establishing what a constitutional death penalty would look like, the Court in 1976 called for heightened standards of reliability in capital cases. In the late 1970s and early 80s, the Supreme Court laid out specific constitutional procedures that must be applied in capital cases, and left the door open for the Eighth Amendment to do even more. In the decades that followed, state and federal courts have fueled a perception of heightened procedural rigor in capital cases by referring repeatedly to the heightened standards applica-ble in capital cases.

However, a review of courts’ application of a standard of “heightened reliability” reveals that (1) courts routinely use the language of “heightened” standards while simultaneously applying exactly the same constitutional tests that are used in noncapital cas-es and demonstrating no serious effort to tie procedural rigor to the severity of punishment; and (2) even more problematic, some courts have shown a willingness to use the “heightened reliability” lan-guage to justify a lesser procedural protection for capital defend-ants than that applied to noncapital cases—a perverse application of what was clearly intended to be an added measure of assurance that the death penalty is reserved only for those who are truly guilty and who are the most culpable.

This decades-long failure to observe meaningfully heightened constitutional standards calls into question the death penalty’s in-stitutional legitimacy and raises particular concerns in light of cur-rent Supreme Court trends.

University of Illinois Law Review, Forthcoming. 47 Pages Posted: 19 Apr 2023

By Maresi Starzmann and Andrew Taylor

The reform prosecution movement faces a critical moment. With the recent uptick in violent crime, reform prosecutors face unprecedented attacks and calls for a return to “tough-on-crime” tactics. Those attacks rest on the false belief that criminal legal system reforms endanger public safety. To sustain the movement, reform prosecutors must build the case that their approach will make communities safer, and the Vera Institute of Justice’s (Vera’s) Reshaping Prosecution initiative is well-positioned to help them do so. Reshaping Prosecution works with prosecutors to build evidence that alternatives to incarceration offer a better path to safer communities. In doing that work, Vera centers race equity and emphasizes collaborating with communities because the path to solutions begins with the voices of those most proximate to the issues. Vera’s partnership with Wyandotte County District Attorney (DA) Mark Dupree’s office from 2019 to 2022 represented a unique pilot to center marginalized voices in prosecution reform efforts. Vera provided its traditional quantitative analysis of racial inequities to highlight

New York: Vera Institute of Justice, 2023. 38p.

By Philip Mullen, Clare Collins, and Katy Savage

This research was commissioned by HM Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) to identify the factors preventing defendants to engage in criminal courts processes. We interviewed 38 defendants with recent criminal cases and explored how they can better be supported in various stages of courts processes, especially around legal representation, from their own perspective.

The report details how the lack of user-friendly and timely information or support with signposting create additional barriers for defendants, and how early intervention is key to foster engagement.

London: Revolving Doors, 2022. 55p.

By Beth M. Huebner, Andrea Giuffre

Investigations in Ferguson, Missouri, revealed that many individuals, particularly Black people, entered the criminal justice system for relatively minor offenses, missed court appearances, or failure to pay fines. Municipal courts were focused on revenue generation, which led to aggressive enforcement of municipal codes. Although subsequent reforms were passed, little is known about whether and how the legislative changes influenced the law-in-action in the municipal courts. Using data from qualitative interviews with St. Louis area residents and regional court actors, as well as court observations, this article documents the legal structure of municipal courts in the region after Ferguson. We address how the parochial nature of municipal courts in St. Louis County perpetuates the financial marginalization of residents through the layering of punishment, and how the state legal structure further facilitates control, even after reform.

RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences January 2022, 8 (1) 108-127; DOI: https://doi.org/10.7758/RSF.2022.8.1.05

By Bugmy Bar Book Committee

Launched in 2019, the Bugmy Bar Book is a free, evidence-based resource hosted on the website of the NSW Public Defenders.

The project publishes accessible summaries of key research on the impacts of the experience of disadvantage and strengths-based rehabilitation. It provides objective research across several areas of disadvantage, to support both the application and decision-making processes, when subjective information is unable to be obtained.

The project is directed by a Committee comprised of representatives of key stakeholders in the criminal justice system (including the NSW Public Defenders, NSW Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, Aboriginal Legal Service (NSW/ACT) Limited and Legal Aid NSW), the judiciary (including the Supreme Court of NSW, District Court of NSW, Local Court of NSW, ACT Magistrates Court and NSW Judicial Commission), legal academics (including senior academics from UNSW, ANU and UTS) and members of the private legal profession. Although the project originated and is based in NSW, the resources are designed for use across all Australian jurisdictions and the committee engages with stakeholders Australia-wide.

Who is the Bugmy Bar Book For?

It aims to promote greater understanding of the impacts within the legal profession and judiciary, with the key function being to assist in the preparation and presentation of evidence to establish the application of the sentencing principles in Bugmy v The Queen (2013) 249 CLR 571.

The application of the materials in the Bugmy Bar Book can also be used in other contexts, including bail and mental health diversionary applications, various civil practice areas, coronial inquests and other inquisitorial jurisdictions.

By Heather Harris and Stephanie Barton

Adopting untested policies helped California courts resolve criminal charges safely amid a public health crisis. Of the main policies, only remote hearings have endured—and their future is uncertain. Assembly Bill 199 allows California courts to conduct most criminal hearings remotely only through 2023.

This report chronicles how the COVID-19 pandemic affected the courts in 2020, describes policy responses, and assesses the impact of remote hearing policies on conviction and sentencing outcomes within six months of arrest.

Pandemic conditions challenged the courts’ capacity to resolve cases. An estimated 55,000 criminal cases that would have completed within six months remained unresolved at the end of 2020.→

Courts acted swiftly to adapt to pandemic conditions. Three main strategies included modifying pretrial release to reduce jail populations, permitting remote hearings, and extending case timelines.→

Uneven adoption of policies, coupled with geographic differences in where people live, meant that Black and Latino defendants had greater potential than people of other races to experience pandemic policies.→

Remote hearing policies reinforced pandemic trends for lower conviction rates, but counteracted trends in sentencing. When remote hearing policies were in place, rates of conviction within six months of arrest fell, with outcomes for white, Latino, and Black people driving this result. Misdemeanor convictions were less likely to lead to jail and more likely to receive noncustodial sentences such as probation and money sanctions, mainly for white, Latino, and Black people. Felony convictions were less likely to result in prison and more likely to lead to jail, and outcomes for Black people dominated this result.→

Remote hearing policies contributed to racial differences in criminal case outcomes. Inequity in conviction and jail sentence rates narrowed between white and Latino defendants and between white and Black defendants. By contrast, racial inequity widened in the likelihood of being sentenced to money sanctions and probation.→

Arguably, whether a criminal proceeding is conducted virtually or in person should not influence whether a person is convicted or how they are sentenced; yet remote hearing policies have affected both. Before Assembly Bill 199 expires, policymakers will need to determine whether these outcomes are desirable and how to factor them into decisions about whether to allow criminal cases to proceed remotely.

San Francisco: Public Policy Institute of California, 2023. 42p.

By Maisie Karam, Jennifer Lukassen, Zoran Miladinovic, and Marnie Wallace

The efficiency and effectiveness of the Canadian criminal justice system has been a key focus of national discussion in recent years. Despite recent declines in the crime rate and a decreasing number of completed court cases nationally, charges in Canadian criminal courts have been taking longer to complete over the past decade (Miladinovic 2019b). This apparent disconnect has resulted not only in the Supreme Court of Canada’s R. v. Jordan decision (see Text Box 2) which imposed a presumptive ceiling for completing criminal court cases beyond which the delay is considered unreasonable, but has also sparked renewed interest in improving and measuring the efficiency of the current criminal justice system.

The Department of Justice Canada undertook a criminal justice system review starting in 2015 and spanning a three-year period, in which stakeholders, partners and Canadians were consulted on their ideas regarding how to strengthen and modernize the criminal justice system (Department of Justice Canada 2019a). Throughout this review, participants highlighted a number of key concerns, including lengthy delays for a case to get to trial, long case processing times, and a court system that is overly occupied with relatively minor administration of justice offences.

Around the same time, the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs was mandated to review the roles of the Government of Canada and Parliament in addressing court delays. In addition to releasing 50 recommendations, the final report, Delaying Justice is Denying Justice: an Urgent Need to Address Lengthy Court Delays in Canada (2017), identified a number of factors contributing to lengthy delays including a lack of robust case management, a shortage of judges, prosecutors and courtrooms, as well as the increasing complexity of criminal trials.

Lengthy trials and other delays in court case processing have a significant impact on both accused persons and victims, as the stress of waiting for a resolution is made worse by each adjournment. Further, lengthy and delayed criminal proceedings have an impact on the quality and reliability of evidence (Senate Canada 2017). Ongoing and repeated delays in the court system can also diminish public confidence in the criminal justice system, which is fundamental to its operation.

Recent attempts have been made to address the inefficiencies that have been identified, including the introduction of former Bill C-75 (An Act to amend the Criminal Code, the Youth Criminal Justice Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts),Note which is intended to modernize the criminal justice system and reduce delays (Department of Justice Canada 2019b).

Historically, data from the Integrated Criminal Court Survey (ICCS) has focused on completed cases, allowing for a retrospective look at the work that has been completed by the courts. The national conversation on court efficiency, however, now requires the ability to analyze the full scope of work going on in the court system, including ongoing or active cases. The full extent of the challenges faced by the Canadian criminal justice system, as well as any future progress, can only be known through the ongoing measurement of various aspects of court workload and case processing.

This report introduces a series of new criminal court workload and case processing indicators (see Text Box 1) based on open cases in order to add to the ongoing conversation about the efficiency of criminal courts in Canada. The development of these new indicators was made possible because of strong collaborative partnerships with key stakeholders. The Canadian Centre for Justice and Community Safety Statistics (CCJCSS) at Statistics Canada would like to acknowledge those who shared in the growing interest to expand the standard ICCS indicators in order to address existing data gaps, in particular, the Sub-Committee on Court Statistics (CSI) for the Steering Committee on Justice Efficiencies and Access to the Justice System and the Heads of Court Administration, Court Statistics and Information Sub-Committee (HoCA CSI).

The analysis in this Juristat is divided into seven sections. The first looks at the inventory of open cases and addresses such questions as: how many court cases start in a given year, and how many are open at a given time? What do open cases look like? The second section begins to analyze the age of open cases. The third section focuses on at-risk cases, specifically how many are potentially at risk of being stayed due to unreasonable delays. The fourth section examines completion rates. An analysis of case processing times makes up the fifth section of the report. The sixth section focuses on court workload and attempts to answer questions concerning how much overall work goes into closing cases. The final section addresses court backlog and analyzes the courts’ ability to meet the demands of incoming cases. Throughout the report, trends are presented for the last 10-years, as well as by offence, province and territory, and court level where relevant.

Ottawa: Statistics Canada, 2020. 31p.

By Carl Lieberman, Elizabeth Luh and Michael Mueller-Smith

Millions in the United States face financial sanctions in the criminal court system each year, totaling over $27 billion in overall criminal debt. In this study, we leverage five distinct natural experiments across multiple states using regression discontinuity designs to evaluate the causal impact of these sanctions. We consider a range of long-term outcomes including employment, recidivism, household expenditures, and other self-reported measures of well-being, measured using a combination of administrative records on earnings and employment, the Criminal Justice Administrative Records System, and household surveys. We find consistent evidence across the range of natural experiments and subgroup analyses of precise null effects on the population, ruling out long-run impacts larger than +/-3.6% on total earnings and +/- 4.7% on total recidivism. These results are inconsistent with theories of criminal debt poverty traps but also do not justify using financial sanctions for local revenue or as a crime control tool.

Unpublished paper, 2023. 54p.

By Matthew Menendez, Michael F. Crowley, Lauren-Brooke Eisen, and Noah Atchison

The past decade has seen a troubling and well-documented increase in fees and fines imposed on defendants by criminal courts. Today, many states and localities rely on these fees and fines to fund their court systems or even basic government operations.

A wealth of evidence has already shown that this system works against the goal of rehabilitation and creates a major barrier to people reentering society after a conviction.

They are often unable to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars in accumulated court debt. When debt leads to incarceration or license suspension, it becomes even harder to find a job or housing or to pay child support. There’s also little evidence that imposing onerous fees and fines improves public safety.

Now, this first-of-its-kind analysis shows that in addition to thwarting rehabilitation and failing to improve public safety, criminal-court fees and fines also fail at efficiently raising revenue.

The high costs of collection and enforcement are excluded from most assessments, meaning that actual revenues from fees and fines are far lower than what legislators expect. And because fees and fines are typically imposed without regard to a defendant’s ability to pay, jurisdictions have billions of dollars in unpaid court debt on the books that they are unlikely to ever collect. This debt hangs over the heads of defendants and grows every year.

This study examines 10 counties across Texas, Florida, and New Mexico, as well as statewide data for those three states. The counties vary in their geographic, economic, political, and ethnic profiles, as well as in their practices for collecting and enforcing fees and fines.

New York: Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law 2019. 68p.

Edited by Michiel Van der Wolf

This edited collection provides an interdisciplinary and cross-national perspective on safeguarding the quality of forensic assessment in sentencing offenders. Taking an in-depth look at seven different Western countries, each chapter provides an overview of the role of assessment in sentencing offenders, as well as a focus on formal ways in which the respective country’s legal system and disciplinary associations protect the quality of forensic assessment. Each chapter explores how to assure better decision making in individual cases based on assessments of psycholegal concepts such as mental disorder/insanity, criminal responsibility and dangerousness. Combining the perspectives of lawyers, legal scholars, and clinicians working in the field, this book is essential for those working in and with forensic assessment.

New York; London: Routledge, 2022. 281p.

By Kate Weisburd

The day-to-day operation of criminal court supervision—including probation, parole, and electronic ankle monitoring—is understudied and undertheorized. To better understand the mechanics of these systems, this study comprehensively analyzes the rules governing people on criminal court supervision in the United States. Drawing on the analysis of 187 public records from all fifty states, this study documents how criminal court supervision functions and impacts daily life. In particular, this study examines the various ways that supervision rules limit or restrict privacy, bodily autonomy, liberty, dignity, speech, and financial independence. This study also explores the nature and prevalence of supervision rules across the United States. Ultimately, the analysis of the rules offers empirical evidence that court supervision imposes significant restraints on people’s ability to thrive and, in doing so, risks legitimating the subordination of historically marginalized groups.

58 Harv. C.R.-C.L. L. Rev. 1, 2023.

Used book-may contain mark-up

By Alan M. Dershowtiz

Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes once observed that "hard cases make bad law." In Taking Liberties, Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz writes for the layperson about the hard cases and thorny issues that come before our courts today. Should parents be compelled to testify against their own children? Can your employer force you to submit to a random drug test, even if you never have used drugs? Does the government have the right to find out what home videos you have rented? Should an otherwise qualified nominee to the Supreme Court be rejected solely on grounds of his ideology? Where is the line between vigilantism and self-defense? Does the jury have the final say on matters of truth? How should the victims of AIDS be treated in the workplace and in the schools? To scores of questions like these, each arising from the issues of an actual case or controversy, Dershowitz offers incisive and often surprising an- swers. Outspoken, thought-provoking, Taking Liberties is a book to savor and enjoy--a rare opportunity to watch one of America's foremost legal minds at work.

New York. Contemporary Books. 1988. 348p.

By Steve Yeong and Sara Rahman

In February 2019, the NSW Government appointed seven new judges to the NSW District Court (the DC7 reforms) as a measure to address the rising number of pending criminal matters. We examine whether the appointment of these judges resulted in an increase in the monthly number of finalised matters in the NSW District Criminal Court (DC). To do this, we compare DC finalisations before and after the reforms for six NSW courts who experienced an increase of at least 10 sitting weeks to eight NSW courts who did not experience any increase in sitting weeks following the reform. Monthly finalisations over the period 1 January 2014 to 30 September 2020 are examined.

Sydney, AUS: NSW Bureau Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, 2021. 23p.

By Shannon Tomascak, Preeti Chauhan, and Allie Meizlish

In this report, the Data Collaborative for Justice (DCJ) examines how criminal summons issuance and outcomes have changed in New York City from 2003 to 2019, adding six years of data to update DCJ’s prior report on criminal summons enforcement between 2003 and 2013. This new report builds on DCJ’s prior research by: (1) examining trends in criminal summons issuance and outcomes within the context of significant policy reforms including the implementation of the Criminal Justice Reform Act (CJRA) and changes in marijuana enforcement; (2) assessing trends in summonses by charge type, demographics, borough, warrant issuance, and dispositions; and (3) focusing on the most recent year of data (2019) to help the public and policymakers assess recent enforcement of criminal summonses and identify opportunities for further reform.

New York: The Data Collaborative for Justice (DCJ) at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, 2020. 47p.

Edited by Gerhard Werle and Andreas Zimmermann

The chapters in this book are reworkings of presentations given during a conference held in 2018 at the German Embassy to the Netherlands in The Hague on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the adoption of the Rome Statute. They provide an in-depth analysis of major points of contention the International Criminal Court (ICC) is currently facing, such as, inter alia, head of state immunities, withdrawal from the Rome Statute, the exercise of jurisdiction vis-à-vis third-party nationals, the activation of the Court’s jurisdiction regarding the crime of aggression, as well as the relationship of the Court with both the Security Council and the African Union, all of which are issues that have a continued relevance and carry a particular controversy. The collection provides insights from both practitioners, including judges of the ICC, and diplomats who participated in the negotiations leading to the adoption of the Rome Statute, as well as well-known academics from various parts of the world working in the field of international criminal law. The aim of the book is not only to inform and stimulate academic debate on the topic, but also to serve as an instrument for lawyers involved in the practice of international criminal law.

Cham: Springer/T.M.C. Asser Press, 2019. 174p.

By William A. Schabas

The International Criminal Court has ushered in a new era in the protection of human rights. Protecting against genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, the Court acts when national justice systems are unwilling or unable to do so. Written by the leading expert in the field, the fourth edition of this seminal text considers the Court in action: its initial rulings, cases it has prosecuted and cases where it has decided not to proceed, such as Iraq. It also examines the results of the Review Conference, by which the crime of aggression was added to the jurisdiction of the Court and addresses the political context, such as the warming of the United States to the Court and the increasing recognition of the inevitability of the institution.

Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011. 594p.

By Andrew Nowak

This book is about the International Criminal Court (ICC), a new and highly distinctive criminal justice institution with the ability to prosecute the highest-level government officials, including heads of state, even in countries that have not accepted its jurisdiction. The book explores the historical development of international criminal law and the formal legal structure created by the Rome Statute, against the background of the Court’s search for objectivity in a political global environment. The book reviews the operations of the Court in practice and the Court’s position in the power politics of the international system. It discusses and clarifies all stages of an international criminal proceeding from the opening of the investigation to sentencing, reparations, and final appeals in the context of its restorative justice mission. Making appropriate comparisons and contrasts between the international criminal justice system and domestic and national systems, the book fills a gap in international criminal justice study.

Cham: Springer, 2015. 133p.

By Color Of Change and ACLU’s Campaign for Smart Justice

Every year in the United States, millions of people are forced to pay cash bail after their arrest or face incarceration before trial. This is despite the fact that they are presumed innocent and have not been convicted of a crime. To avoid being locked up while their cases go through the courts—which can sometimes take months or even years—people who cannot afford bail must pay a non-refundable fee to a for-profit bail bonds company to front the required bail amount. The financial burden of this fee harms individuals, it harms families, and it disproportionately affects Black and low-income communities. The only winner is the bottom line of big for-profit businesses. These harms are perpetuated by the large insurance corporations that control the two-billion dollar for-profit bail bonds industry, which is both unaccountable to the justice system and unnecessary to justice itself. Large companies whose only goal is profit should not be the gatekeepers of pretrial detention and release. The for-profit bail system in the United States fuels mass incarceration and contributes to racial and economic inequalities. It is a destructive force that undermines the rights of people who come into contact with the criminal justice system, and it must be abolished.

New York: American Civil Liberties Union, 2017. 64o,