Free Republic

Changes in bail system beneficial By Jeff Clayton / Executive Director, American Bail Coalition Sunday, December 4th, 2016 at 12:02am There has been a lot information – and misinformation – written about New Mexico’s new constitutional amendment on bail. Therefore, it is important to understand just what happened and what the amendment will actually mean for the state. As a person on the front line of this issue, I wanted to share my thoughts on the ramifications of this amendment. First, the idea that bail bondsmen or monetary conditions of bail is somehow going away is not the case. Of...

FROM CLANTON TO SACRAMENTO: HOW THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT WANTS TO END MONEY BAIL IN CALIFORNIA October 11, 2016 By Stephen Frank AB 109 released 50,000 criminals from prison. Prop. 47 assured tens of thousands of criminals they would not be arrested or if arrested, given very short terms in County jail. Prop. 57 on the November ballot makes sure that rapists are considered non-violent criminals and most crimes are made into lesser sentences—if passed, it will be surprising if a criminal serves as much as ten years in prison. Now the Leftists are trying to make sure criminals who are...

It seems not a week goes by without hearing about the death of an African-American at the hands of law enforcement. Tamir Rice, Eric Harris, Walter Scott, Jonathan Ferrell, Sandra Bland, Samuel DuBose, Freddie Gray -- the names would be a blur except they represent real people whose lives have ended needlessly. As a 51-year-old African-American male who was born and raised in Houston Gardens, I’ve seen more than my share of violence in our communities. Actually, I’ve seen more than my share because I’m a bail bond agent and run the family business founded by my father 27 years...

Despite nationwide efforts to curb domestic violence, recent evidence suggests that the problem isn’t going away anytime soon. The Los Angeles Police Department released statistics in January that showed violent crime actually increased 14.3% the past year, the majority stemming from domestic violence. The New York City Housing Authority released late last year that showed domestic violence to be on the rise in public housing, with nearly twice the number of reported incidents from 2009 to 2013. And in Seattle, the local YWCA provided services to 10,515 abused women in 2014 – an increase of nearly 10% from the year...

Jail overcrowding here in California has been an ongoing problem for many years. However, it has been greatly exacerbated by AB109, the prison realignment initiative, which has pushed increasing numbers of convicted state prisoners down to our local jails. The influx of these individuals has overwhelmed community leaders, who are at a loss as to how to handle inmates that county jails were never intended to accommodate. County jails were originally designed to house persons awaiting trial (pretrial populations), as well as those serving sentences of one year or less. Those with longer sentences were sent to a state prison....