As Maryland weighs options for reforming the state’s bail system, the bail bond industry is boosting campaign contributions to politicians who could mandate changes that would abolish the bail industry, a new report found.
Industry donations to lawmakers totaled $87,000 in 2016, significantly more than in previous years, Common Cause Maryland revealed in a January analysis on lobbying.
Read more about those findings and other bail reform news below.
Cleveland.com is examining bail systems locally and across the country in a series, Justice For All, as Cuyahoga County leaders consider ways to make their bail systems fairer.
Maryland: The bail bond industry has already donated $135,250 in the first two years of the current election cycle, putting it on track to surpass the $153,300 donated in the last cycle. Maryland ranks third behind California and Florida for campaign donations by the bail bonds industry.
The chairs of committees that oversee industry-related legislation were the largest recipients of the donations. Sen. Bobby Zirkin brought in $78,200 from 2011-2017 and $37,000 in 2014 alone, 11 percent of all the money raised by his campaign that election cycle. House Delegate Joseph Vallario collected $45,500 in six years, and $33,500 in 2014, 13 percent of what he raised that cycle.
“Our research on the bail industry demonstrates how private industry spending buys influence,” Common Cause wrote. “The bail industry and its key members, use strategic campaign spending to build strategic relationships in Annapolis.”
The industry has not made the same political investment in Ohio, according to the National Institute on Money in State Politics, which provided the data for the Common Cause study. It has donated less than $27,000 to politicians here since 1998.
Texas: State Supreme Court Chief Justice Nathan Hecht is calling on the legislature to overhaul a bail system that discriminates against poor defendants and limits judges’ abilities to jail risky suspects.
“High-risk defendants, a threat to society, are freed,” Hecht said in his State of the Judiciary address Wednesday, according to Houston Public Media. “Low-risk defendants sit in jail, a burden on taxpayers. It makes no sense.”
Hecht’s comments come as the state’s largest county, Harris, faces a federal lawsuit that alleges inequitable bail practices.
Courts in five Texas counties have begun to implement reforms, and now use validated assessment systems to help determine which defendants can safely be released. The Texas Judicial Council recommends the rest of the state follow suit, Hecht said.
California: The California insurance commissioner, whose department regulates the bail bond industry, plans to introduce bail reform legislation to the California State Assembly within the next 60 to 90 days, according to CBS San Francisco.
“We shouldn’t have a system where your detention is based on your income,” Commissioner Dave Jones said last week at a hearing on the state’s bail system, CBS reports. “There are allegations that’s the system we have.”
Representatives from an advocacy group that is suing San Francisco and Sacramento, alleging unconstitutional bail practices, also testified at the insurance commission hearing.
“California operates two systems of justice. One for the rich and one for the poor,” said Phil Telfeyan, of Equal Justice Under Law.
Hawaii: The American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice last month requesting the federal government force the state to address the unconstitutionality of bail and other criminal justice practices.
More than 1,000 people, almost 20 percent of the state’s total inmate population, sit in Hawaii’s jails for months every year awaiting trial, the ACLU reports.
The organization calls for reforms that would compel judges to determine release based on defendants’ risk of flight or of committing crimes, rather than ability to pay.
“Such reforms are not only more just and equitable, but they also reduce overcrowding and the cost of incarceration without endangering public safety,” the ACLU wrote in a news release.
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