[Cash bail creates a two-tier justice system where freedom belongs
to those who can afford it. For poor people, Illinois’s new bail
reform bill is a step toward justice. For melodramatic conservatives
drowning in propaganda, it’s right out of a horror film. ]
[[link removed]]

ILLINOIS IS ELIMINATING CASH BAIL. TO HYSTERICAL CONSERVATIVES,
IT’S THE END OF THE WORLD.  
[[link removed]]


 

Akil Vicks
September 19, 2022
Jacobin
[[link removed]]


*
[[link removed].]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ Cash bail creates a two-tier justice system where freedom belongs
to those who can afford it. For poor people, Illinois’s new bail
reform bill is a step toward justice. For melodramatic conservatives
drowning in propaganda, it’s right out of a horror film. _

Illinois will end cash bail beginning January 1. , (Sophie Elbaz
/Sygma via Getty Images)

 

In February of 2021, Illinois governor J. B. Pritzker signed
the SAFE-T Act into law
[[link removed]].
The act was actually a package of reforms aimed at curbing police
abuses and protecting the rights of citizens. The most contentious of
the reforms passed in the bill was the Pretrial Fairness Act, which
would abolish cash bail in the state beginning January 1, 2023.

Reactionaries did what they do best and reacted. Conservatives in
Illinois and across the country have taken to comparing a bill meant
to eliminate economic disparities in pretrial detention to the hit
movie franchise The Purge
[[link removed]].

The cinematic universe of The Purge encompasses five films and a
television show, with a sixth film in development. The unifying
premise is that, in a dystopian future, the powers that be have
instituted an annual “Purge Night” where all crime is legal and
people are encouraged to unleash their worst impulses on the world.
The original 2013 film, starring Ethan Hawke, was a tense and
claustrophobic horror thriller. The subsequent films widened the
franchise’s scope, becoming explicitly concerned with how the rich
and powerful view the poor and marginalized as disposable playthings.

This latter aspect of The Purge makes it especially ironic that
conservatives are referencing it to attack legislation meant to
address racial and economic inequalities in the justice system. If any
base impulses are being unleashed, it can be found in lawmakers’ and
pundits’ willingness to outright lie about what the law does in
order to fearmonger voters into preserving a two-tiered justice
system.

Fear and Loathing in Illinois

State Representative Jim Durkin published an op-ed
[[link removed]] in
the _Chicago Tribune_ claiming that the SAFE-T Act would give
“drug cartels free rein in Illinois.” Orland Park mayor Keith
Pekau claimed in a town meeting
[[link removed]] that
the bill would prevent police from removing trespassers from private
property or businesses. Before the SAFE-T Act was signed into law,
Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot blamed pretrial release for an uptick in
gun violence, saying, “We can’t keep our community safe if people
just keep cycling through the system.”

What these two Republicans and one Democrat have in common, along with
numerous law enforcement spokespeople and many others denouncing the
bill, is that none of what they are saying is true. In the case of
Mayor Lightfoot, emails leaked in May of 2021
[[link removed]] showed
that her own staff couldn’t find evidence to corroborate the claim
that pretrial release led to a surge in gun violence. Nevertheless,
the narrative pushing the dangers of bail reform persisted.

The attacks against the SAFE-T Act have proliferated on social media,
where comparisons to The Purge became popular. But this blowback
against criminal justice reform is not as organic as it may seem.
Governor Pritzker accused local right-wing radio host Dan Proft of
spreading racist propaganda
[[link removed]] riddled
with falsehoods to help Republican gubernatorial candidate Darren
Bailey in the upcoming election.

Proft did not deny sending anti–bail reform mailers to targeted
(read: white, middle-class) areas of the state with the aim of
propagating fear and anger and undermining Pritzker politically.
Instead, he alleged that Pritzker had “signed the state’s death
warrant with his no cash bail law,” and challenged him
[[link removed]] to
name “one specific item in the newspaper [mailer] you excoriate that
is untrue or inaccurate.” Of course, this challenge doesn’t
present much difficulty to anyone who has actually read the bill.

Gone Too Far or Not Far Enough?

Critics of the Pretrial Fairness Act, as the bail reform portion of
the SAFE-T bill is known, describe a situation where violent offenders
will be arrested and immediately released if their alleged crime is
one of those listed in the purported newspaper clipping circulating
among Illinois voters. Likewise, a group of state attorneys penned
another _Chicago Tribune_ op-ed warning
[[link removed]] reform-minded
lawmakers that they have gone too far in their efforts to abolish cash
bail:

Those who originally voted for this bill are now realizing that they
may have gone too far when they see more and more citizens from across
the state becoming victims of violent crimes, allegedly committed by
defendants released without bail pending felony prosecution.

According to these allegations, suspects accused of committing
felonies like second-degree murder will be undetainable by law
enforcement while they are awaiting trial. In reality, the bill does
not remove the possibility of pretrial detainment for certain
offenses, but actually removes cash bail as a factor for release for
bail-eligible offenses. Judges will review offenders on a case-by-case
basis, and can remand people to pretrial detention if they are deemed
a flight risk or an immediate threat to others.

It’s important to note that bail reform has already happened in
Illinois. In 2017, Cook County, which encompasses the greater Chicago
area, instituted reforms
[[link removed]] that
limited reliance on cash bail for release and gave judges more
discretion in the matter. A study by Loyola University Chicago 
[[link removed]]responded
to claims that this reform led to increased crime and noted that the
changes in policy had a minimal effect on who was actually released
pretrial. Only about five hundred additional defendants, most accused
of nonviolent offenses, were released due to reforms to the bail
system. Additionally, the study found no significant difference in the
chances of a person released pretrial committing additional offenses
before and after the reforms were instituted.

The charge that the SAFE-T Act would prevent officers from removing
people who are trespassing is equally disingenuous. The bill requires
that officers give people citations for trespassing offenses rather
than arresting them. This does not mean that an officer can’t arrest
someone for failing to comply with a lawful order to vacate premises
where they are not allowed to be.

Reactionaries harping about the threat to citizens posed by bail
reform and the SAFE-T Act in general are lying about what the law
means for people living in the state. By fear-mongering with specious
claims of state-sanctioned lawlessness, they are distracting from a
long-overdue conversation about why abolishing cash bail is a
necessary and just reform.

The Truth Shall Set You Free

The simple fact is that cash bail creates a two-tier justice system.
When an offense is bail-eligible, the only difference between who
remains in jail and who is released pretrial is who can afford bond.
There really isn’t any way to frame this as an equitable legal
practice. This economic inequality for pretrial detention becomes even
more objectionable when you consider that black defendants are more
likely to be unable to afford bail than their white counterparts,
contributing to the racial disparities within the justice system.

Pretrial detention has been shown to increase negative outcomes
[[link removed]] for
those in jail awaiting trial. Contrary to the line taken by opponents
of reform, people held before trial are more likely to commit
additional offenses upon release because of the disruptive nature of
incarceration on employment and the negative influences of other
prisoners. Pretrial detention also encourages innocent people
to plead guilty to crimes they did not commit
[[link removed].].
Court backlogs mean that people can be made to wait months or even
years for a trial, giving prosecution a position of leverage over
defendants to accept plea deals, no matter the strength of the case.
This means that people who are held pretrial are more likely to be
convicted than those who receive pretrial release. Additionally, those
who are released are more likely to receive favorable deals when
pleading guilty.

 

The infamous and tragic story of Kalief Browder
[[link removed]] is
particularly illustrative of this issue. Browder, who was sixteen at
the time of his arrest, spent three years detained at Rikers Island
for allegedly stealing a backpack. His family could not afford the
$3,000 bond for his release. The case against Browder was eventually
dropped, but in those three years, an incalculable amount of damage
was done. Two years after his release, Kalief Browder took his own
life.

What seems to have escaped the consideration of bail reform’s
critics is that the people being held in pretrial detention have not
been convicted of a crime. It appears that, in the conservative
estimation, the presumption of innocence only applies to the wealthy.
The backlash to the legislation has been swift and strong,
artificially propped up by Republican operatives looking to the
tried-and-true rhetoric of Democrats being soft on crime to buoy
themselves in the upcoming midterm elections. The Illinois bill has
already been watered down to remove limits on officer qualified
immunity and other checks on police conduct, but state officials have
held strong on abolishing bail.

The 2017 bail reform measure in Cook County saved defendants and their
families some $31.4 million in pretrial costs. That is a significant
sum for poor and marginalized people who, again, have not been
convicted of a crime. Abolishing cash bail isn’t a complete solution
to the racial and economic disparities in the justice system. Leaving
pretrial release to the discretion of judges still carries the risk
that bias will create disparate outcomes. However, in their zeal to
resist any sort of reform to the bail system, conservatives have
demonstrated their true belief in what the criminal justice system is
meant to do: to remove poor people from society.

_Akil Vicks works in clinical research and is a member of River Valley
Democratic Socialists of America. He writes about politics and culture
at onone.substack.com
[[link removed]]._

* bail reform
[[link removed]]
* Illinois
[[link removed]]
* backlash
[[link removed]]
* Conservatives
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed].]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web
[[link removed]]

Submit via email
Frequently asked questions
[[link removed]]

Manage subscription
[[link removed]]

Visit xxxxxx.org
[[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]