The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to take up a case that accused a Texas county of having cash bail practices that violate the constitutional rights of detainees by discriminating against those who are poor.
Dallas County judges established a system of bail “schedules,” which correlate bail amounts with specific criminal charges. These schedules are used by magistrates to order preset cash bail amounts as a condition of release, and arrestees who can’t afford their bail amounts are detained for weeks or months before getting a chance to be released.
Balancing Rights and Risks
Detractors of cash bail argue that the practice creates a two-tiered system that disproportionately affects the poor. Those who can afford to post bail after being arrested are released from detention until trial, while those who cannot must sit in jail until they appear in court.“No person should be kept in a cage just because she doesn’t have enough money to make a payment,” attorney Elizabeth Rossi of the Civil Rights Corps, one of the groups that filed the suit, said in a statement at the time the suit was filed.
“The decision to throw a person who is presumed innocent in a jail cell is a serious one. And a person’s access to money should not be the only factor that determines whether she is free or is in jail,” Ms. Rossi added.
Cash bail has its proponents, however, who argue that eliminating the practice means that more people charged with crimes will be out on the streets, making society less safe.
Dallas County lawyer Kate David praised the Supreme Court action in an email to the Dallas Morning News.
“The judges in Dallas County can continue to serve the community by balancing the rights of defendants with the risks to the public and crime victims,” Ms. David wrote.
The Epoch Times has reached out to the ACLU with a request for comment on the Supreme Court’s decision but did not receive a response by publication time.‘General Deterrence’
California’s Los Angeles County recently implemented a new bail schedule commonly described as zero bail or no-cash bail, which eliminates the financial requirements for release from pretrial custody for all but the most serious offenses.In August 2023, during a hearing on the zero-bail policy, Los Angeles Police Chief Michael Moore testified in favor of cash bail, saying that when the general public sees arrestees immediately released, it has the “potential of significantly undermining the public’s trust.”
Mr. Moore said he did not agree, as detractors of cash bail have repeatedly argued, that cash bail creates a two-tiered system.
Under the county’s zero-bail policy, county law enforcement has three categories to choose from after a suspect is arrested—cite and release, book and release, or magistrate review, meaning the case should be reviewed by a magistrate judge before applying bail.
Examples of offenses that will require magistrate reviews are crimes involving firearms, sexual battery, violence against children or seniors, and persons arrested for a felony while on parole or community supervision.
