"Critics of New York's bail reforms keep ignoring two fundamental two fundamental facts about criminal justice system: One people are considered innocent until proven guilty. And two, the purpose of bail is to ensure that a person shows up for court - not to summarily deprive them of freedom before trial."
JULY 27, 2022
by Times Union Editorial Board
Critics of New York’s bail reforms keep ignoring two fundamental facts about our criminal justice system: One, people are considered innocent until proven guilty. And two, the purpose of bail is to ensure that a person shows up for court — not to summarily deprive them of freedom before trial.
Those aren’t quaint aspirations. They are essential features of any system of justice worthy of the name. Without them, we would exist in a society in which government officials could jail people on a whim, without going to the trouble of proving their case. These protections are very much part of the concepts of law and order and the rule of law.
Yet here we are again, with New York Republicans and conservatives — who profess to stand for law and order and for reining in the power of big government — railing against the reforms that were designed to ensure, as the Pledge of Allegiance goes, justice for all. Reforms meant to keep police interrogators and prosecutors from using the threat of onerous bail and lengthy imprisonment without trial to extract guilty pleas from people too poor to afford counsel and reliant on an overwhelmed system of public defense. Reforms designed to equalize a system in which those with money could go free pending trial, while those without it languished behind bars.
The renewed attack on bail reform comes from, among others, Republican gubernatorial nominee Lee Zeldin. His law-and-order platform doesn’t go quite so far as condemning former President Donald Trump for fomenting the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, the very heart of America’s democracy, but focuses rather on the politically contrived issue of bail reform.
