January 16th, 2018 by WCBC Radio

Maryland's judges and its public defender say bail reform adopted last year is working, cutting in half the number of people who are jailed because they can't afford to post bond.

In the past, the state’s criminal justice system has held thousands of defendants simply because they couldn’t afford to pay bail, a practice that Attorney General Brian Frosh and former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder have criticized.

Maryland’s highest court voted unanimously last year to overhaul the bail system last year, requiring judges to consider whether defendants’ are able to pay bail when they set conditions for release.

As a result, about one-fifth of defendants are being held because they can’t or don’t pay bail, down from 40 percent in months before the reforms were enacted, Judge John Morrissey, chief judge of the District Court of Maryland, said Tuesday. About 53 percent of those who appear before a bail commissioner are released from custody, up from 44 percent before the reforms, he said.