So this time it's PBUS that posts a link to a symposium held at BYU Law School on misdemeanor justice. Above the link, PBUS quotes a summary of Malcom Feeley's keynote, which says, "Professor Malcom Feeley critiqued prior reforms: Bail reform, pre-trial diversion, and electronic monitoring were innovations that ultimately failed to change incarceration rates and inflamed issues of race and poverty in the justice system."
And, as always, a bunch of folks "liked" and "shared" the post without really thinking about it or reading the summary.
You have to wonder -- did PBUS really think deeply about what Feeley was saying, or did some dude who places the Facebook posts just see the words "bail reform" and "failed" and think, "Man, this is great!"
If you actually read it, you'll see that Feeley was criticizing prior bail reform efforts, which did fail. This is exactly what I teach as I go across the country presenting on bail. It's what PJI teaches. It's what Equal Justice Under Law and Civil Rights Corps teaches. It's what everyone on my side of this thing teaches. Both generations of bail reform in America failed to do what they intended -- for several reasons that I doubt PBUS has even thought of.
Feeley gives a fairly radical solution to the problems of race and poverty in the criminal justice system, which involves recognizing the inherent fragmentation of American Courts and applying "theories of management and public administration for guidance." Get it? I didn't think so. Feeley is a brilliant criminal justice guru, who is likely to be grossly misunderstood by people who think other people should pay to get out of jail.
The bigger issue is that BYU law held a symposium, in which a guy giving a keynote said prior bail reform efforts had failed, and in which two others said that money bail has caused high rates of pretrial detention.
Which is exactly what I've been saying for 10 years.
So, basically, if you like or share PBUS's Facebook post, you're agreeing with me.
