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posted by martyb on Monday September 03 2018, @09:52PM   Printer-friendly
from the Rich-and-poor-treated-the-same dept.

California Governor Jerry Brown has signed Senate Bill 10, the California Money Bail Reform Act, eliminating cash bail in the state:

An overhaul of the state's bail system has been in the works for years, and became an inevitability earlier this year when a California appellate court declared the state's cash bail system unconstitutional. The new law goes into effect in October 2019. "Today, California reforms its bail system so that rich and poor alike are treated fairly," Brown said in a statement, moments after signing the California Money Bail Reform Act.

The governor has waited nearly four decades to revamp the state's cash bail system. In his 1979 State of the State Address, Brown argued the existing process was biased, favoring the wealthy who can afford to pay for their freedom, and penalizing the poor, who often are forced to remain in custody.

[...] Under the California law those arrested and charged with a crime won't be putting up money or borrowing it from a bail bond agent to obtain their release. Instead, local courts will decide who to keep in custody and whom to release while they await trial. Those decisions will be based on an algorithm created by the courts in each jurisdiction.

Bail agents disapprove.

See also: California's 'cautionary tale' for others considering no cash bail system
California's bail bond empire strikes back


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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 04 2018, @02:24AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday September 04 2018, @02:24AM (#730080)

    No, what it means is that the court can't require money as a condition to let somebody out of jail while awaiting trial. The courts can still seize passports and subject defendants to supervision and tracking rather than sitting in jail.

    The problem with the previous system is that you'd have people who couldn't afford to pay the bail sitting in jail for sometimes many months during which time they couldn't work and would lose everything. This is before they even had a trial and regardless of whether or not they were guilty. So, in many cases they'd just plead out get community service and a criminal record, but the record might be suspended and they wouldn't lose their house.

    Meanwhile the wealthy would have little trouble fronting the money for bail and would be released pending trial. Even snakes like Manafort, he must have been a real dumb ass to get caught witness tampering, but he had the funds to get bail and was under supervision awaiting trial when he got caught.

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