Albuquerque Journal: New pretrial release rules are positive step

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As two former U.S. attorneys who have over 54 years of legal experience combined, we’ve both had our fair share of prosecuting dangerous criminals. We’ve also seen countless people caught up in the justice system who made mistakes. Throughout our careers, we saw what works in our criminal justice system and what areas are in dire need of improvement.

Since then, both of us have used our voices to advocate for various reforms to the system, and more importantly, focus on what keeps us safe. That’s why we agreed to speak on a panel titled “Putting Public Safety First in Pretrial,” co-hosted by the Rio Grande Foundation and Justice Action Network in Albuquerque tonight.

Before voters enacted Amendment 1 in 2016, most municipalities in New Mexico required defendants arrested for crimes to post a cash bond before they could be released from jail. This posed some real problems for the state. Instead of allowing judges to make decisions based on how much risk a defendant posed to public safety, dangerous individuals accused of violent crimes were allowed to go free if they had enough cash on hand to post their bonds. On the other hand, those who posed little to no risk to public safety routinely languished in jail cells ahead of their trials – at taxpayer expense – simply because they couldn’t afford bail.

https://www.abqjournal.com/1229002/new-pretrial-release-rules-are-positive-step.html