The purpose of bail is to get people out of jail.
There continues to be broad misunderstanding of that basic principle among Californians generally, and blatant violation of it — knowing or otherwise — among police and judges. The right to bail under the state and federal constitutions routinely gets stood on its head, so that instead of being used to get people out of jail, bail is misused to keep people in.
That point is driven home by a recent study of bail decisions issued by judges in several counties since the California Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in In re Humphrey more than a year and a half ago. In that March 2021 decision, the court struck down money bail orders that defendants can’t afford. It was a ruling that should have been so obvious as to be unnecessary. The constitutional right to bail is a conditional right to release before trial, and is rendered meaningless if bail is set so high that the defendant can’t pay.
