If you have money, you can pay the bail and get released, while poor people can’t.
I don’t see why people with money should get benefits in the legal system?
The 8th amendment has a clause that disallows “excessive bail”. In Stack v. Boyle, the Supreme Court found this to mean “that a defendant’s bail cannot be set higher than an amount that is reasonably likely to ensure the defendant’s presence at the trial.” So it follows that IN THEORY, bail is SUPPOSED to be set at an amount that is consistent with the defendant’s financial resources (including, it would also follow, increasing the amount for more wealthy people to ensure that it has the same proportionate effect on the defendant’s decision-making process).
Of course, that rule is just a bunch of meaningless words if nobody enforces it… and guess what, the main way to enforce this is by bringing a suit against the government alleging that they violated the rule. So IN PRACTICE (speculation warning here, I’m just some guy), I would imagine that they just set bail schedules at a level where anyone who can afford to pay won’t be able to win an “excessive bail” lawsuit, and anyone who can’t afford to pay it will also probably not be able to afford the cost of that lawsuit.
And something tells me that we aren’t likely to see a wealthy person suing the government for not setting bail high enough for them.
cannot be set higher than an amount that is reasonably likely to ensure the defendant’s presence at the trial
That is a sentence that you can really roll over in your head. It does not necessarily also mean an amount within the resources of the defendant. I watch a lot of hearings, and something I’ve seen at least a few times is a set of allegations and past facts (usually something like multiple failures to appear in the past, and/or fleeing from police) in a situation where the actual charge being bailed on has a statutory requirement that bail be offered. The judge doesn’t want to let the person out on bail, so therefore sets the bail at $1 million or something which is functionally the same thing as not giving them bail.
Usually this triggers a motion for a hearing about the bail amount by the defense lawyer to argue down the amount, but if the court date on the charge is earlier than court date for the motion, it becomes a moot issue.
Just so we’re clear, bail is a temporary release from imprisonment while you’re awaiting trial. And the bail money is a deposit that you get back when you attend trial.
The purpose of lodging the bail money is to give you an incentive to attend trial, and the judge will consider your income when they decide the bail amount. A rich person might have to post more bail than a poorer person.
The last time I saw this question asked on reddit, the OP thought paying bail was an alternative to serving prison time if you’re found guilty of a crime.
This avoids the whole premise of it though. It is supposed to be if they are a threat to not showin, but mostly a threat to the public as well, you set no bail. Non violent crimes make 0 sense to have bail on. If you don’t attend there is a warrant placed for your arrest whether or not you paid bail. Also, ONLY rich people get all of their money back. The majority of the population posts bail using a bail bondsmen, so if they set your bail at $3000, you pay a bail bondman $300 to get out of jail until the court case (which will take months). You do not get that $300 dollars, the bondsmen gets it when you show up. If you do NOT show up, the bail bond company hires a bounty hunter to come after you, on top of the warrant for your arrest often times.
So you get pulled over for an accusation, are “innocent” until proven guilty, but either are forced to pay money to gain freedom, or are placed in jail until getting decided “innocent” as you already were
you only need a bondsman if you are arrested for a felony, you(or friend) can just pay your full bond or the 10% (which you don’t get back) bondsmen normally charge extra on the 10% e.g paying 330 instead of the 300. it’s normally not a bounty hunter just the bondsman that’ll come if anyone since you’ll have a warrant for your arrest anyways.
innocent until proven guilty is bullshit considering they take your mugshot/fingerprints at arrest. and if your too poor for the full bond you’re out money just for freedom. which is shit along with court cost and fines it’s a system made to keep the poor poor
Bail is not money you get back. It’s money that a bail bondsman doesn’t have to fork over if you dont show.
Either you are so rich that the opportunity cost of tieing up the whole amount is more than the fee (so you just pay the bond fee) or you don’t have enough and need to ask someone to lend it to yoy (that is, you pay the bond.)
New York tried to largely ban cash bail (becaue its essentially just a way to lock up the poor), but because of Republicans and police unions (i repeat myself) who whined about offenses while out on bail, the state poked a bunch of holes in it instead of making pre-trial detention easier.
Cash bail is ALWAYS indefensible. If someone is so dangerous to civic order they need to be detained pre-trial, then no amount of money should get them out of it.
Well it’s not insane because the laws in the us are made to be chains for the poor and spiderwebs for the rich. This is on purpose.
The lies we tell ourselves to cope, and the “justifications” the powerful use to keep those laws in place are what’s insane.
It is, I don’t think it can be explained as “not insane”
It is biased towards the rich. Much of American society and laws are biased towards the rich or biased towards large corporations.
So it is insane, but since it’s just as insane as the rest of the system, you aren’t supposed to notice.
