[NoMoreNicksLeft]

>The ACLU has a nice FAQ on the evils of "cash bail" here [0].

There's nothing evil about it in principle. Securing someone's presence at trial requires that they lose something if they fail to show. When judges set bail so high that people cannot afford it out of pocket, they are at fault. Not the concept of cash bail. If bail were set at amounts people could afford, they do not lose the money... it is returned when they show for trial regardless of the verdict.

Our constitution actually has an amendment, in the Bill of Rights no less, forbidding excessive bail. Has no one ever heard of it?

The judges do this shit for many reasons. For one, when someone should not be remanded on bail because they are a danger to society, judges will often set the bail at eleventy zillion dollars, knowing that they won't be able to post bail. But in doing so, they slowly erode psychological norms among their colleagues as to what is excessive. The presence of a bail bond industry, and the lobbying of bail bondsmen only makes it worse. Most of the people you know actually believe that all bail money is forfeited because of bail bonding.

The only solution needed is means-testing bail amounts.

[qingcharles]

Illinois required means-tested bail even before they scrapped cash bail, by statute. Not a single judge complied with the legal requirements. It was totally arbitrary. Because the judges could not be trusted the decision was stripped from them entirely.

And yes, the 8th Amend. forbids excessive bail too.

Nobody cared enough.

Also, even if a defendant was adequately means-tested it doesn't mean they can access their wealth from within jail. Really hard to get your Charles Schwab 2FA codes inside a cell.

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

>Illinois required means-tested bail even before they scrapped cash bail, by statute. Not a single judge complied w

You say "required", immediately followed by "not complied". These two concepts are mutually exclusive. If one requires it, compliance is not optional, if one allows non-compliance, then there is no requirement. Illinois may have mentally retarded legislators, or lunatic judges, or both. The latter is especially possible if judges are willing to do no bail, after having done constitutionally impermissible excessive bail. In any event, those judges could be impeached, one after another, and if the judges attempted to fight being impeached through procedure, executed for literal crimes against humanity.

>Also, even if a defendant was adequately means-tested it doesn't mean they can access their wealth from within jail. Really hard to get your Charles Schwab 2FA codes inside a cell.

While you might be correct in principle, I suspect that the sorts of people being arrested don't actually have a Charles Schwab 2FA codes. If this turns out to be a problem (which I doubt), there are practical solutions that could be implemented. Sheriffs' deputies can be sent along with the defendant to retrieve said wealth or whatever.

[gottorf]

> For one, when someone should not be remanded on bail because they are a danger to society, judges will often set the bail at eleventy zillion dollars, knowing that they won't be able to post bail

Why can't they just deny bail in such cases? Is it local laws that forbid them from doing so? In which case, it seems that the ability to set a ridiculously high bail is a net benefit to society.

[qingcharles]

Yeah, a lot of places required a bail amount of something. The joke is on the judge, though. When I checked in 2022 in Cook County there were 92 homicide cases out on bail, each having paid an average of around $150K cash.

There were also hundreds of minor shoplifting and other petty cases with bail set at $250 or less who had been locked in the jail for months since they could not afford to bond out.