No place for falsehoods in bail reform debate

I was disappointed to see tired, recycled falsehoods about bail reform sully the article “Data muddles bail rule debate,” July 26.

The sensationalist scenario Albany County District Attorney David Soares describes “of a person who shoots someone on Friday, and under bail reform, may be released and out on the street on Saturday” is simply false. The crime of attempted murder is and has always been baileligible, as Soares should know.

Later, Soares says the bail law should be limited to misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies, which is exactly the case, with incredibly limited exceptions for offenses that do not involve weapons.

Finally, Soares, like most other opponents of reform, provides no data to back up his claims linking bail reform to crime. Even the New York Police Department’s data refutes Soares’s claims, showing that from the first half of 2020 “just one person released under the statewide bail reform laws passed Jan. 1 had been charged with a shooting.”

As FWD.US published in its report that documented media negligence in coverage of New York’s bail reform, the problem of misinformation about reform is widespread. The many column inches dedicated to fearmongering have crowded out the real story — about thousands of people, mostly Black and brown New Yorkers, who were able to safely await trial at home during a deadly pandemic.

In addition to factchecking the claims of law enforcement officials, it’s time for the media to re-evaluate the stories it tells about the criminal justice system, the people who are most harmed by that system, and the people it treats as experts in those stories.

Rodney Holcombe

New York City New York criminal justice

director at FWD.US