SAN FRANCISCO — A controversial statewide court order that provided bail relief to low-level arrestees — and keep them out of jails trying to tamp down COVID-19 spread — is set to expire after California’s judicial rule-makers voted to rescind the policy.
In a vote announced late Wednesday afternoon, the Judicial Council, led by Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye, chose 17-2 in favor of ending the $0 emergency bail schedule that has been in place since April 13. The order expires June 20, though individual county Superior Courts will have the discretion to institute their own local orders to preserve the policy.
“The Judicial Council’s action better reflects the current needs of our state, which has different health concerns and restrictions county-to-county based on the threat posed by COVID-19,” Justice Marsha Slough said in a statement Wednesday. “We urge local courts to continue to use the emergency COVID-19 bail schedule where necessary to protect the health of the community, the courts, and the incarcerated.”
Slough added that county courts have by June 20 to indicate “whether they plan to keep the COVID-19 emergency bail schedule, or another reduced bail schedule.” The vote was not held live, and no public hearings were held prior to the vote.
Since its enactment, law-enforcement agencies across the state have been critical of the $0 bail order, arguing that it has prevented police from keeping repeat offenders off the street.
“We expressed serious concerns about the impact of $0 bail as we felt it would result in inappropriate early release of potentially dangerous offenders and those who would continue to reoffend if not held accountable,” Eric R. Nuñez, president of the California Police Chiefs Association, said in a statement. “We applaud the Judicial Council for voting on whether to rescind their $0 bail schedule.”
Public defenders and criminal-justice reform advocates argue that cash bail — which faces extinction in California on the November ballot — has only served to keep people of color and poor people in pretrial incarceration while those with financial resources, committing the same crimes, can go free. They also assert, as the Judicial Council did Monday, that crime rates have remained low during the pandemic with the $0 bail schedule in effect.
“Do Judicial Council members watch the news? There’s a nationwide uprising against systemic racism, and the council chooses this moment to give counties permission to return to the mass pre-trial incarceration of Black and Brown people,” Alameda County Chief Public Defender Brendon Woods said in a statement following the vote. “Now my only hope is that judges here in Alameda County do better and decide to continue with our local version of the emergency bail schedule. That’s the only way we’re going to keep the virus from spreading in our jails and communities.”
The Judicial Council indicated it explored shifting discretion on $0 bail to local courts on the premise its emergency order largely achieved its goal decreasing jail crowding amid the coronavirus pandemic. Combined with a statewide volley of pretrial releases of nonviolent defendants, and amnesty of expiring sentences, California’s jail population decreased 30% between the end of February and the first week of May, from about 72,000 to roughly 51,000 inmates, according to state figures.
Still, public defenders say the emergency posed by COVID-19 in jails has not subsided to a level that justifies ending the bail relief. In Santa Clara County, after recording six infected inmates in the first two months of the local shelter-in-place order, there have been at least 12 new jail cases confirmed since the last week of May.
Separate from Wednesday’s vote, Cantil-Sakauye rescinded an emergency order that extended arraignment deadlines, which had meant people could be jailed for as long as seven days before being formally charged. The standard arraignment window is two days.
Similar emergency extensions, like those for speedy trial deadlines, remain in place. Those measures have also been subject to intense criticism from defense attorneys who say the measures disproportionately impede due process for minority and poor defendants whose primary avenues for challenging their pretrial incarceration relies on swift access to court hearings.
Check back for updates to this story.
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