Jailed for Being Broke
By Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone
June 23, 2015
It’s not easy to get the public to care about bail. It’s particularly hard for people with little exposure to the criminal justice system to sympathize with those who get arrested, particularly for crimes of violence.
What people forget is that those who’ve merely been charged with crimes aren’t officially guilty yet. And not-yet-guilty people aren’t supposed to go to the hole, except under very narrowly defined sets of circumstances – for flight risks or for threats to the community. It’s certainly not supposed to be a punishment for not having $500.
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In the wake of Ferguson and Baltimore, there’s been a lot of attention focused on police violence, as a symbol of the unfairness baked into our justice system. But when it comes to civil rights issues and the Wealth Gap, bail is where the rubber meets the road. You can walk into any arraignment court, anytime, and see how bad it is. Is it really that hard to fix?
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