Ending or limiting the use of monetary bail has become an increasingly common criminal legal system reform across the country. Reformers and researchers have long supported such measures, but opponents — including district attorneys, police departments, and the commercial bail industry — often claim pretrial reform puts community safety at risk. We put these claims to the test.

We found four states, as well as nine cities and counties, where data exist measuring public safety from before and after the adoption of pretrial reforms. All of these jurisdictions saw decreases or negligible increases in crime or re-arrest rates after implementing reforms.

Below, we describe the reforms implemented in each of these 13 jurisdictions, the effect these reforms had on the pretrial population (if available), and the effect on public safety. We find that whether the jurisdictions eliminated money bail for some or all charges, began using a validated risk assessment tool, introduced services to remind people of upcoming court dates, or implemented some combination of these policies, the results were the same: Releasing people pretrial did not negatively impact public safety.

About 83% of people held by jails are legally innocent and awaiting trial, often because they are too poor to make bail. The overall jail population hasn’t always been so heavily dominated by pretrial detainees. As we’ve previously reported, increased arrests and a growing reliance on money bail over the last three decades have contributed to a significant rise in pretrial detention. Any time spent in pretrial detention can increase rates of failure to appear in court and rates of re-arrest. And research shows that just a few days of pretrial detention can have detrimental effects on an individual’s employment, housing, financial stability, and family wellbeing.

In this analysis, public safety is measured through the narrow lens of crime rates. But pretrial reforms promote other types of safety that are more difficult to measure, such as the safety of individuals who can remain at home instead of in a jail cell, children who are able to stay in their parents’ care, and community members who are spared the health risks that come from jail churn. (Furthermore, research has found that pretrial detention actually increases the odds of a person being re-arrested in the future, which is clearly counterproductive from a crime rate-defined public safety standpoint.) Pretrial reform also alleviates jail overcrowding, and is a superior alternative to new jail construction for counties with overcrowded jails.

Read the full article about releasing people pretrial by Sarah Staudt at Prison Policy Initiative.