‘The gates are open’: Illinois ending cash bail system

VIENNA, Ill. (KFVS/Gray News) - Illinois is getting ready for some changes in 2023 that include eliminating its cash bail system.
However, select lawmakers and law enforcement officials say it could make communities more dangerous.

Coming soon to blue cities/states everywhere! This will be the law of the land in Illinois as of January 1 2023. Commit any of these crimes, and you'll be released without bail so long as you pinkie swear you'll show up for your court date. Genius!

 

The real criminals are the ones behind this insanity.

 

But yet other countries are able to manage with extorting money for bail and allowing people to profit from it. Why is it such a problem for the USA?

 

posting bail allows people to have a financial reason to return to court. The problem is allowing violent criminals to go right back to harming citizens. that’s not working out.

 

This makes me so angry. I just want to let everyone know that I was in the past accused of a non-violent crime, and denied bail.
Accused of something that wouldn't even have constituted a crime a hundred years ago.

Meanwhile people who have been accused of very violent crimes are now being released without any bail.

This is ideologically based. Right has been turned into wrong, and wrong right. Topsy turvy justice and morality.

 

Your non violent crime would likely be covered by this as well. Cash bail is just punishing the poor. People ens up dying in jail, locked up for a crime they didn’t commit, because they can’t afford bail.

 

The cash bail system criminalizes poverty

After an arrest — wrongful or not — a person’s ability to leave jail and return home to fight the charges typically depends on access to money. That's because, in virtually all jurisdictions, people are required to pay cash bail in order to secure their freedom. Originally, bail was designed to ensure people return to court to face charges against them. Now we know that simple solutions like court reminders often can achieve that purpose. And, the money bail system has morphed into one that perpetuates widespread wealth-based incarceration. The pretrial incarceration caused by unaffordable bail is the single greatest driver of convictions, and is responsible for the ballooning of our nation’s jail and prison populations.

Poorer Americans and people of color often can't afford to come up with money for bail, leaving them incarcerated in jail awaiting trial, sometimes for months or even years. Meanwhile, wealthy people accused of the same crime can buy their freedom and return home.
https://www.aclu.org/issues/smart-justice/bail-reform


The California Supreme Court has eliminated cash bail for defendants who can't afford it — writing that "conditioning freedom solely on whether an arrestee can afford bail is unconstitutional."

In California, the state Supreme Court has ruled to end cash bail if a defendant can't afford to pay. The decision centers around the case of retired shipyard worker Kenneth Humphrey. In 2017, he was arrested and accused of stealing $7 and a bottle of cologne from his San Francisco neighbor. The court set bail at $600,000 and later reduced it to $350,000. Humphrey couldn't afford to pay that. And now the California Supreme Court has written that, quote, "conditioning freedom solely on whether an arrestee can afford bail is unconstitutional."
https://www.npr.org/2021/03/29/9824...y-with-cash-bail-for-those-who-cant-afford-it

 

Cash bail produces two-tiered systems of justice and reinforces the nation's stark racial and economic disparities

Profit Over People: Primer on U.S. Cash Bail Systems

An individual’s ability to afford bail is the single most important factor in determining if they are released to the community pretrial or if they await their trial from a jail cell. Courts regularly assign cash bail as a condition of pretrial release based on the belief that paying bail is necessary to ensure appearance in court and protect public safety—but evidence has shown this belief is unfounded. In reality, assigning cash bail fails to address the root causes that lead a minority of people to miss trial, undermines the safety of the arrested individual and the broader community, leads to racially and economically disparate cash bail assignments and pretrial detentions, and drains economic resources primarily from families and communities of color.

https://www.americanprogress.org/article/profit-over-people-primer-on-u-s-cash-bail-systems/

 

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed a landmark criminal justice reform package into law Monday, making the state among the first to eliminate the use of cash bail. The sweeping overhaul, passed by the Illinois General Assembly during the final hours of its January lame-duck session, includes changes to almost every area of the justice system — from police accountability to pretrial detention to sentencing.


Nonviolent defendants who cannot pay for release will no longer remain incarcerated before trial, reversing a measure that opponents say criminalizes poverty. Instead, judges must impose the least restrictive conditions necessary to ensure a defendant’s appearance in court.
https://www.injusticewatch.org/news/2021/illinois-criminal-justice-reform-cash-bail-felony-murder/



A Tour Of Bail: How Other States Have Reformed The Money Bail System

States across the country have taken stabs at reforming how the money bail system operates. In West Virginia, the state legislature passed HB 2419, a law enacted in June 2020 that aimed to limit bail amounts, and by extension, shrink the exploding jail population.

HB 2419 calls for judges and magistrates to use discretion when assigning bail by using the least restrictive means necessary to ensure the accused person’s appearance in court. The law encourages judges to release certain nonviolent offenders on personal recognizance bonds, which is a formal agreement where the accused person is released from jail on the promise that they will return for trial.
https://www.wvpublic.org/top-storie...er-states-have-reformed-the-money-bail-system

“We do not want someone in jail because they were arrested for a low-level crime like shoplifting to be sitting in jail for months or maybe even years,” Pritzker said.


Prosecutors are required to submit a request for detention if the offender committed a crime that poses a threat to public safety. The state also is required to provide each suspect a hearing within 48 hours to determine if the suspect should be released.

https://www.thecentersquare.com/ill...cle_5c4785ee-2231-11ed-9974-6b98b3dd2078.html

 

WOW THE US IS REALLY A CRIME INFESTED PLACE, APPARENTLY

Despite making up close to 5% of the global population, the U.S. has more than 20% of the world's prison population. Since 1970, our incarcerated population has increased by 500% – 2 million people in jail and prison today, far outpacing population growth and crime.

Mass Incarceration
https://www.aclu.org/issues/smart-justice/mass-incarceration#:~:text=Despite making up close to,outpacing population growth and crime.


''The World Prison Brief's data estimates the U.S. incarceration rate at 639 inmates per 100,000 people as of 2018, or 13% higher than the rate of the next-closest country, El Salvador (564 inmates per 100,000 people).''

 

$80 billion

The United States spends over $80 billion on incarceration each year.


Blacks are incarcerated for drug offenses at a rate 10 times greater than that of whites, despite the fact that blacks and whites use drugs at roughly the same rates.



Local, state, and federal governments spend anywhere from $20,000 to $50,000 annually to keep an individual behind bars.

https://www.aclu.org/issues/smart-justice/mass-incarceration#:~:text=Despite making up close to,outpacing population growth and crime




WOW DIDN'T REALIZE HOW DANGEROUS THE US HAD BECOME SINCE REAGANOMICS

 

Arsonists and murderers can walk away but the 1/6 protesters….?

Libs, are you in favor of the 1/6 protesters getting no bail and allowed to go home? I know, I know, but that’s different.

 

Sorry to bore you







The Prison Industrial Complex
https://churchandprison.org/documents/the-prison-industrial-complex/

 

Who goes to jail for using drugs? Have you seen the streets of San Francisco?

You go to jail for dealing in large quantities and priors.

 

Tell it to Kamala Harris. Do you know her history of prison slavery?

 

Better idea....don't let anyone out until they have been acquitted. If they are acquitted give them $1 million as restitution on top of paying for their lawyer fees (no more court appointed lawyers who are crap 9.9 times outta 10 anyways).

 

Federal:
For many Schedule I and II controlled substances, the first trafficking offense is punishable by at least 5 years in prison


Under California drug sentencing guidelines, most instances of simple drug possession (for personal use) get charged as misdemeanors rather than felonies. The crime is punishable by: imprisonment in county jail for up to one year, and/or. a maximum fine of $1,000.

Drug Possession Jail Time in California
After Proposition 47, drug possession crimes are punished as misdemeanors only, with penalties including up to one year in the county jail and a $1000 fine. This includes possession of:

• Benzodiazepines: Examples include Xanax, Valium, and Librium. A doctor can prescribe these medications to help patients with disorders like anxiety.
• Stimulants: Examples include amphetamines, methamphetamine, MDMA, Ritalin, Adderall, and cocaine. Some of these are available via prescription to treat disorders such as ADHD.
• Hallucinogens including mescaline, peyote, psilocybin (mushrooms), LSD, MDMA, and ketamine.
• Opiates: Examples include heroin, codeine, oxycodone, and Vicodin. Some of these are available via prescription, such as oxycodone, as options for pain relief.
• Steroids: An example would be testosterone which is available via a doctor’s prescription.

Jail time can be increased if you are charged with felony drug possession because of a prior conviction or if you possessed a loaded firearm while you had the drug.

https://www.simmrinlawgroup.com/faq...o-jail-for-possession-of-drugs-in-california/

Mar 14, 2022 — Police still make over 1 million drug possession arrests each year, many of which lead to prison sentences.
https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2022.html

 

While this pie chart provides a comprehensive snapshot of our correctional system, the graphic does not capture the enormous churn in and out of our correctional facilities, nor the far larger universe of people whose lives are affected by the criminal justice system. In a typical year, about 600,000 people enter prison gates, but people go to jail over 10 million times each year. Jail churn is particularly high because most people in jails have not been convicted. Some have just been arrested and will make bail within hours or days, while many others are too poor to make bail and remain behind bars until their trial. Only a small number (about 103,000 on any given day) have been convicted, and are generally serving misdemeanors sentences under a year. At least 1 in 4 people who go to jail will be arrested again within the same year — often those dealing with poverty, mental illness, and substance use disorders, whose problems only worsen with incarceration.
https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2022.html




https://www.masslegalservices.org/s...ip_between_Poverty_and_Mass_Incarceration.pdf


Recent research indicates that, if not for the rise in incarceration, the number of people in poverty would fall by as much as 20 percent. doubled in the three decades prior to the Great Recession, but the poverty rate remained largely unchanged.
https://www.masslegalservices.org/s...ip_between_Poverty_and_Mass_Incarceration.pdf

 

Snotloller at the “blacks use drugs at the same rate as whites”. That’s a highly and absurdly dishonest argument. Most people aren’t in jail for USING drugs. They’re in jail for SELLING drugs.

Tell us do blacks and whites sell drugs at the same rate?

 

Drug offenses still account for the incarceration of almost 400,000 people, and drug convictions remain a defining feature of the federal prison system.
https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2022.html

 

So the USE of drugs should get dipropionate sentencing?

The Racial Disparity in U.S. Drug Arrests
Since blacks are 40% of drug violation arrests but only 13% of admitted drug users, there is an apparent disparity of 27 percentage points
https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/rdusda.pdf


Despite knowledge of racial bias for drug-related criminal justice involvement and its collateral consequences, we know less about differences between Black and White drug offenders. We compare 243 Blacks and White non-violent drug offenders in New Haven, CT for demographic characteristics, substance use, and re-entry services accessed. Blacks were significantly more likely to have sales and possession charges, significantly more likely to prefer marijuana, a less addictive drug, and significantly less likely to report having severe drug problems

The overwhelming increase in incarceration, attributed to the drug war, has disproportionately impacted Black communities. In 2011, Blacks were incarcerated at a dramatically higher rate than Whites (5–7 times) and accounted for almost half of all prisoners incarcerated with a sentence of more than one year for a drug-related offense (Carson and Sabol 2012).

Accordingly, researchers and policy analysts have sought to understand both the causes and effects of the nation’s war on drugs and its implications for racial equality (Ghandoosh 2015; Travis, Western, & Redburn 2014; Alexander, 2012; Drucker 2013; Mauer 2006). They have explored racial bias in the criminal justice system and criminal justice outcomes, including police practices, arrest rates, convictions, sentence lengths, diversionary opportunities, and community supervision; judicial policies and laws such as precedent-setting court cases and mandatory minimum sentences; and media trends and their influence on public opinion. This literature demonstrates greater likelihood of Black involvement in the criminal justice system through policing practices and sentencing policies for drug-related crime, differences in sentencing practices and case processing, and the heightened disadvantage Blacks face once they are removed from their communities, and upon return, as labeled felons and drug offenders.

While a decades-long war on drugs has ravaged Black communities, lately attention has turned to the recent surge in heroin and painkiller use and overdose among Whites, particularly those in suburbs


...The Comprehensive and Addiction Recovery Act of 2015 will be considered by Congress to help states address the dramatic increases in prescription opioid and heroin use in the United States through prevention and rehabilitation efforts. The response to the current opioid epidemic, a public health crisis with a “white face,” has been contrasted to the crack epidemic that hit Black communities hard in the 90s and was met with war tactics in affected communities rather than compassion for offenders (Yankah 2016). Such contrasting policy responses have prompted some to raise the question of racially biased motivations and their implications (Mauer 2016).

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5614457/



Oct 21, 2016 — Black and white Americans sell and use drugs at similar rates, but black Americans are 2.7 times as likely to be arrested for drug-related crimes

At State level, blacks are 6-1/2 times as likely to be incarcerated than whites
https://www.hamiltonproject.org/cha...y_race_rates_of_drug_related_criminal_justice


The drug war has produced profoundly unequal outcomes across racial groups, manifested through racial discrimination by law enforcement and disproportionate drug war misery suffered by communities of color.
https://drugpolicy.org/issues/race-and-drug-war

 

White people are more likely to deal drugs, but black people are more likely to get arrested for it


Sep 30, 2014 — Arrest data show a striking trend: arrests of blacks have fallen for violent and property crimes, but soared for drug related crimes. As of 2011, drug crimes comprised 14 percent of all arrests and a miscellaneous category that includes “drug paraphernalia” possession comprised an additional 31 percent of all arrests. Just 6 percent and 14 percent of arrests were for violent and property crimes, respectively.


Even more surprising is what gets left out of the chart: Blacks are far more likely to be arrested for selling or possessing drugs than whites, even though whites use drugs at the same rate. And whites are actually more likely to sell drugs:

Whites were about 45 percent more likely than blacks to sell drugs in 1980, according to an analysis of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth by economist Robert Fairlie. This was consistent with a 1989 survey of youth in Boston. My own analysis of data from the 2012 National Survey on Drug Use and Health shows that 6.6 percent of white adolescents and young adults (aged 12 to 25) sold drugs, compared to just 5.0 percent of blacks (a 32 percent difference).

This partly reflects racial differences in the drug markets in black and white communities. In poor black neighborhoods, drugs tend to be sold outdoors, in the open. In white neighborhoods, by contrast, drug transactions typically happen indoors, often between friends and acquaintances.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...eople-are-more-likely-to-get-arrested-for-it/


NO PAYWALL LINK
https://archive.ph/tx7uw

Before you go there, yes blacks kill blacks, whites kill whites, it's who you are around

 

Dude, you said ‘using’ drugs. If you look at San Fran, there are plenty of addicts on the street who aren’t being arrested. Also, you don’t go to prison for mere possession, you have to have a large quantity. If we arrested people for merely using and possessing some drugs, Biden’s crackhead son would be serving life.

 

A TALE OF TWO COUNTRIES: RACIALLY TARGETED ARRESTS IN THE ERA OF MARIJUANA REFORM DETAILS MILLIONS OF RACIALLY TARGETED MARIJUANA ARRESTS MADE BETWEEN 2010-2018


The report, A Tale of Two Countries: Racially Targeted Arrests in the Era of Marijuana Reform, details marijuana possession arrests from 2010 to 2018, and updates our unprecedented national report published in 2013, The War on Marijuana in Black and White. The disturbing findings of this new research show that despite several states having reformed marijuana policy over the last decade, far too much has remained unchanged when it comes to racial disparities in arrests.

Key findings include:

• Law enforcement made more than 6.1 million marijuana-related arrests form 2010-2018. In 2018 alone, there were almost 700,000 marijuana arrests, which accounted for more than 43 percent of all drug arrests. In 2018, law enforcement made more marijuana arrests than for all violent crimes combined.
• Despite legalization in a number of states, it is not clear that marijuana arrests are trending downward nationally. Arrest rates have actually risen in the past few years, with almost 100,000 more arrests in 2018 than 2015.
• In every state, and in over 96 percent of the counties examined, Black people were much more likely to be arrested than white people for marijuana possession. Overall, these disparities have not improved. On average, a Black person is 3.64 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than a white person, even though Black and white people use marijuana at similar rates. In 10 states, Blacks were more than five times more likely to be arrested.
• In states that legalized marijuana, arrest rates decreased after legalization, however racial disparities still remained.

“Many state and local governments across the country continue to aggressively enforce marijuana laws, disproportionately targeting Black communities,” said Ezekiel Edwards, director of the Criminal Law Reform Project at the ACLU and one of the primary authors of the report. “Criminalizing people who use marijuana needlessly entangles hundreds of thousands of people in the criminal legal system every year at a tremendous individual and societal cost. As a matter of racial justice and sound public health policy, every state in the country must legalize marijuana with racial equity at the foundation of such reform.”
https://www.aclu.org/press-releases...lization-black-people-still-almost-four-times

 

A story from 2014 using info from 1980. You’re on a roll.