Progressive politicians claim that eliminating cash bail does not increase crime and may even lower it but they did not refer to serious evaluations of the effects. Clearly, if crime does not increase, then eliminating cash bail has clear advantages. If crime does increase, then the disadvantages have to be weighted against the advantages.
One of the first serious academic studies was done by faculty at the University of Utah School of Law. Other work has followed. Hopefully these studies will not be plagued by same philosophical leanings as the studies of allowing concealed handgun carry affected crime. At least for the early studies, the gun nuts seem to find "more guns, less crime" and the gun opponents found the reverse. In recent studies with more data, serious researchers including Phil Cook have found "more guns, more crime" partly because with more guns, the criminal element has better access to stolen guns.
"Does Bail Reform Increase Crime? An Empirical Assessment of the Public Safety Implications of Bail Reform in Cook County, Illinois"
Abstract: Recently bail reform issues have been in the news across the country, as concerns about fair treatment of defendants and possible public safety risks from expanding pretrial release have collided. These issues involve important empirical questions, including whether releasing more defendants before trial leads to additional crimes. An opportunity to investigate this public safety issue has developed in Chicago, our nation’s third largest city. There, the Office of the Chief Judge of the Cook County Courts adopted new bail reform measures in September 2017 and reviewed them empirically in May 2019. Cook County’s Bail Reform Study concluded that the new procedures had released many more defendants before trial without any concomitant increase in crime. This article disputes the Study’s conclusions. This article explains that, contrary to the Study’s assertions, the new changes to pretrial release procedures appear to have led to a substantial increase in crimes committed by pretrial releasees in Cook County. Properly measured and estimated, after more generous release procedures were put in place, the number of released defendants charged with committing new crimes increased by 45%. And, more concerning, the number of pretrial releasees charged with committing new violent crimes increased by an estimated 33%. In addition, as reported by the Chicago Tribune, the Study’s data appears to undercount the number of releasees charged with new violent crimes; and a substantial number of aggravated domestic violence prosecutions prosecutors dropped after the changes, presumably because batterers were able to more frequently obtain release and intimidate their victims into not pursuing charges. These public safety concerns call into question whether the bail “reform” measures implemented in Cook County were cost-beneficial. And because Cook County’s procedures are state-of-the-art and track those being implemented in many parts of the country, Cook County’s experience suggests that other jurisdictions may similarly be suffering increases in crime due to bail reform.
Cassell, Paul and Fowles, Richard, "Does Bail Reform Increase Crime? An Empirical Assessment of the Public Safety Implications of Bail Reform in Cook County, Illinois" (2020). Utah Law Faculty Scholarship. 194.
https://dc.law.utah.edu/scholarship/194
A study for NY finds that some crimes do not increase (assault, theft, and drug crimes). For burglary and robbery, the results are less clear. Their primary specification indicates no increase but they report that the synthetic control is also more variable so these are deemed less conclusive. "An Empirical Evaluation of the Impact of New York’s Bail Reform on Crime Using Synthetic Controls"
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