The Bail Post
What do we know about criminal justice reforms or bail reform? How do we evaluate whether reforms are helping or making the situation worse? How can we take politics out of criminal justice and focus on public safety? The Bail Post seeks to be a place where legislators and the public can educate themselves on a host of criminal justice/bail reform issues. With various attempts at criminal justice reform from New York to Texas to California, many people are confused as to what is working and what is not. With the passage of time, more and more data is coming to light over what successful reform looks like and what reforms have been found to not be working. The rise in violent crime across the country has been startling and law makers and the public alike are desperate to find legislation that is effective. Some might ask whether some of the reforms making the situation worse? The Bail Post is an on-going discussion that seeks to cut to the core to provide education on the various issues raised and to highlight what successful criminal justice reform looks like and what measures have been disastrous. Join us and educate yourself about the best practices that jurisdictions must implement to keep their communities safe, while ensuring fairness to defendants. As a someone said recently "Public safety is the foundation of a society. Without public safety we do not have a society."
If you would like to listen other episodes of The Bail Post you can find a subject matter index of the different episodes at- https://pbtx.blogspot.com/p/subject-index-to-bail-post-podcasts.html.
The host is Ken W. Good; an attorney in Tyler, Texas who has been licensed for over 30 years. He has argued cases before the Supreme Court of Texas and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. Mr. Good has written a book on bail called "Goods On Bail." He has also has had numerous papers published on Criminal Justice Reform issues. Mr. Good is a board member of PBT and serves on the legislative committee. Mr. Good is married and has two daughters.
The Bail Post
Episode No. 34- Looking at the Numbers; How Bail Reform is Increasing Crime with Guest District Attorney Jeff W. Reisig
Over the last few years, reformers have been advocating that changes should be made to the Criminal Justice System on the grounds that bail was not needed; that defendants would go to court anyway. During the COVID-19 pandemic, many of these policies were used and gave us a preview of what the bail reform movement would look like if the policies were retained after the pandemic.
Jeff Reisig is the Independent District Attorney for Yolo County in California. Mr. Reisig released two reports looking at recidivism (new crime) rates of defendants released on zero bail in Yolo County. The first report was issued in August 2022 and found that over 70% of the individuals released on zero bail committed new crimes within 18 months of release.
One of the criticisms to this report was that there was no control group of individuals released on surety bail to give any kind of comparison. Therefore, in February 2023, an updated analysis was released adding a comparison or control group to see if there was a difference in outcomes for individuals released on bail vs. individuals released on zero bail. The results were shocking. Individuals simply released committed new crimes at a substantially higher rate and more quickly than individuals released on surety bail. Why was there such a difference? Join us for this episode of The Bail Post.
If you would like to see the August 2022 report- CLICK HERE.
If you would like to see the February 2023 analysis- CLICK HERE.