Changes are coming to the cash bail system in Detroit. The reforms are intended to make courts more equitable.
Under the agreement with 36th District Court in Detroit, every defendant will have counsel at arraignment, and the court will presume anyone below 200% of the federal poverty level cannot afford cash bail.
Former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder says there are two reasons why programs like this one aren't universal across the country. "A reflexive notion that somehow someway if we have bail we're going to keep the American people safe, which is not empirically shown to be true, and the bail industry which tends to fight these kinds of reforms," he says.
In 2019, the ACLU of Michigan filed a federal lawsuit challenging the cash bail system in Michigan on behalf of seven Detroiters who lost jobs, housing, and parental rights after not being able to afford staying out of jail.
