[runako]

> Many people spend upwards of years before going to trial.

Slight hijack, but this is a key reason behind the movement to abolish cash bail. The thrust of the argument is essentially that people with more financial resources can pay bail. Those without those resources cannot, so the pre-trial period is often a de facto prison sentence whose length is unknown in advance. This setup obviously results in a tiered justice system.

There are ~500k people in jail who are innocent under the law. The elimination of cash bail is intended to eliminate this disparity.

[colejohnson66]

The problem is that if you remove it, what do you replace it with? A judge making the decision if you’re released or jailed awaiting trial. For me, that’s fine, but for some people, that’s not (despite the judge in the current situation setting the bail amount).

<rant>

You end up with things like California’s SB-10 (thankfully overturned by Prop 25[0]) that would’ve replaced it by a risk assessment “AI” black box.[a]

[a]: SB-10 would supposedly have required “tools [that] shall be demonstrated by scientific research to be accurate and reliable”. But what science? Crime statistics says black people commit more crimes, but some claims that those numbers are the result of overpolicing. Who’s right?

[0]: https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_25,_Replace_C...

[runako]

I'm an engineer so this is not an area where I am an expert. But recognizing that we have a system that is openly biased against people without financial resources seems like something we should change.

I understand that DC rarely uses cash bail and has a 40+ year track record showing that 90% of accused show for their trial dates and > 90% are not re-arrested before trial. So maybe since that system seems to work for the most part, we could use that as a basis? Or at least require a very strong burden of proof before we presume people guilty because they are not wealthy?

How much better is the cash bail system at producing defendants at trial than DC's system? Is it so much better that it's worth ignoring our Constitution?

If nothing else, we spend ~$17B incarcerating innocent (again, per our law) people. Seems like an incredible waste of money and human potential. Maybe we try something else.