Pretrial Research Highlights in 2024

This past year saw a growing number of studies around pretrial advancement. As states and localities implement legal and evidence-based pretrial practices, more researchers are looking at trends and challenges—discovering, for example, that pretrial reforms are not leading to increased crime rates. Below are some highlights of the 2024 research.

In 2024, we released or updated several research summaries, including the following.

Financial Conditions of Release (August 2024)
Analysis & Findings: This extensive literature review examined the effectiveness of financial conditions of release in improving court appearances and community safety. No evidence was found that secured financial conditions improve court appearances or law-abiding behavior for people released before trial. Secured financial conditions were found to contribute to higher rates of detention and to exacerbate collateral consequences, racial injustice, and economic disparities.

Court Date Notification Systems (April 2024)
Analysis & Findings: This updated literature review examined the effectiveness of court date notification systems. It found that, overall, court date notification systems can increase appearance rates and provide financial and other nonfinancial benefits, depending on their design, their implementation, and the populations they serve.

Pretrial Detention (April 2024)
Analysis & Findings: With new and updated studies, and a section on the collateral consequences of detention, this updated literature review examined the short- and long-term impacts of pretrial detention on court appearance, community safety and well-being, case outcomes, and the lives of those detained before trial. The studies show that, overall, pretrial detention has long-lasting, negative consequences for people and criminal legal systems. Its use should be limited and occur only following a hearing with full due process protections.

Research continues to demonstrate the impacts that using pretrial assessments has on a range of outcomes, including pretrial detention, community well-being and safety, and racial disparities.

What Happens When Judges Follow the Recommendations of Pretrial Detention Risk Assessment Instruments More Often?
RAND (Anwar, Engberg, Opper, & Dion), September 2024

Data & Methodology: This study employed descriptive statistics and regression analyses of data on pretrial release hearings and judicial adherence to pretrial assessment tools at the Pittsburgh Municipal Court from 2017 through 2019. Due to the random assignment of cases, researchers were able to gauge the causal impact of judges following assessment recommendations.

Analysis & Findings: Researchers investigated the factors that predict whether judges follow assessment recommendations and the impacts on pretrial detention, public safety, and racial disparities when they do. There was a wide variation in judicial adherence to assessment recommendations. When judges departed from recommendations, it was often “because they penalize certain factors—such as criminal history and charge grade—more than the risk assessment does.” The study found that if all judges adhered to assessment recommendations at a high rate, racial disparities would decline, with no impact on public safety.

Bringing Data to the Debate on Risk Assessments
Policy Research Associates & The UMass Chan Medical School Law & Psychiatry Program (Lawson & Vincent, with Vincent-Roller), November 2024

Data & Methodology: This was a systematic review of 21 published and unpublished articles available between January 2000 and July 2023.

Analysis & Findings: This review of studies looked into racial and ethnic disparities in adult and juvenile actuarial assessment tools, including tools used at the pretrial phase. The studies showed “little evidence of differential treatment by the legal system for different racial or ethnic groups as a result of risk assessment use.” The findings show overall support for the use of assessment instruments, particularly those that have the most research on their impact to date. The authors encourage researchers to continue the study of assessment tools, with a focus on more rigorous research methods.

These studies explore the nature of failure to appear rates In New York State and the impact of court date reminders.

Failure to Appear Across New York Regions
Data Collaborative for Justice at John Jay College (Koppel, Ropac, & Rempel), June 2024

Data & Methodology: This study explored statewide publicly available data from the New York Office of Court Administration and the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services to analyze failures to appear (FTA) for all cases arraigned in 2022. It employed descriptive analyses and multivariable models.

Analysis & Findings: Researchers examined failures to appear in New York, with a focus on the nature of pretrial release decisions, the variation of FTA rates across different regions and demographics, and predictors of FTA after controlling for various factors. They found that:

• Violent felonies had the lowest FTA rate of any charge severity (10 percentage points lower than misdemeanors)
• FTA rates varied significantly based on the specific charge, with petit larceny, misdemeanor drug possession, and burglary having the highest rates, and DWI having the lowest rate
• Having a pending case and multiple prior misdemeanors were predictors of FTA
• No demographic characteristic was clearly associated with FTA

Stamping Out Missed Court Dates: How Mailed Reminders Boost Appearance
ideas42, August 2024

Data & Methodology: This study of the court date reminder system in Sacramento County, California, examined the records of 17,257 people involved in 15,038 cases over a 24-month period. The authors employed a quasi-experimental design approach called regression discontinuity in time.

Analysis & Findings: Researchers examining the impact of court date reminders on appearance rates found that:

• Reminding people about upcoming court dates can dramatically reduce nonappearance
• While reminders can take the form of texts or calls, mailed letters with messages on the outside of envelopes are effective
• Simple, inexpensive interventions like reminders save money and time for both the people appearing and the court system

These studies examined pretrial practices adopted in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. These practices generally resulted in greater pretrial release with little, if any, impact on pretrial crime.

Lowering Jail Populations Safely Before, During, and After COVID-19: Updated Findings on Jail Reform, Violent Crime, and the COVID-19 Pandemic
Cuny Institute for State & Local Governance and the Safety and Justice Challenge (Khan, West, & Rosoff), July 2024

Data & Methodology: This study included detailed case-level data from 16 cities and counties participating in the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s Safety and Justice Challenge.

Analysis & Findings: Researchers reviewed the outcomes of people released from jail pretrial due to reform efforts and the COVID-19 pandemic. They found that increased releases did not result in increased violent crime. Most people released from jail on pretrial status did not return to jail custody, and local violent crime rates varied regardless of changes to the jail population—suggesting that jail reduction reforms can be implemented safely.

What Happened When California Suspended Bail During COVID?
Public Policy Institute of California (Premkumar, Skelton, Lofstrom, & Cremin), November 2024

Data & Methodology: Data relevant to changes in pretrial release policy and practice were collected through the state’s Automated Criminal History System and other databases for specific time periods. The study involved descriptive statistical analysis and logistic regression analysis.

Analysis & Findings: This study explored the impacts of an emergency pretrial release policy implemented at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic—an order that reduced money bond amounts for most misdemeanors and felonies to zero dollars. According to the study, the implementation of the emergency order caused notable increases in both the likelihood and number of rearrests within 30 days of the initial arrest, though this effect began to subside after about four months. There was no evidence of an increase in rearrests for violent felonies stemming from the emergency orders, and the revocation of the orders did not affect rearrests, regardless of offense type.

The authors suggest that, during the first few months of the pandemic, the emergency order potentially removed the presence of a short-term incapacitation and/or deterrence effect. However, they acknowledge the nuanced and unprecedented context of the changes in policy during and following the COVID-19 pandemic and are cautious about providing potential explanations for the outcomes reported.

One study highlighted the importance of robust, cross-sector data infrastructure to measuring and improving pretrial practices.

Pretrial Best Practices Preliminary Report: The Need for Better and More Data
Minnesota Justice Research Center (Hall, Remington Cunningham, & Page), February 2024

Data & Methodology: This report summarizes pretrial release and detention law in Minnesota as a backdrop for examining the state’s pretrial data infrastructure.

Analysis & Findings: Authors discuss the importance of data to the design and implementation of a just pretrial system. They identify barriers to understanding the pretrial system, including an opaque data request process, inequalities in access to data, challenges with siloed data, and inconsistent data entry. These each make it difficult to evaluate the state of pretrial justice in Minnesota. Recommendations for improving the pretrial data landscape of the state are provided.

Research again confirms that disparities at pretrial entry points are common and contribute to disparities seen later in the criminal legal system.

Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Pretrial Processes: Cross-Jurisdiction Patterns, Pathways, and Perspectives from the Pretrial Justice Collaborative
MDRC (Anderson, Henderson, Freedman, Eickmeyer, Selby, T-Pederson, & Picard), June 2024

Data & Methodology: This study employed multiple methods, including descriptive analysis, multivariate logistic and linear regression, path analysis, and discussions and focus groups with stakeholders. Data were gathered from seven sites on cases initiated between January 2017 and mid-2020.

Analysis & Findings: Researchers found that racial and ethnic disparities at criminal legal system entry points (e.g., arrests, charging, release-condition decisions) were common across jurisdictions. These disparities persisted when accounting for individual and case characteristics. Entry-level disparities were found to contribute to sentence-length disparities further along the criminal legal system process.

Research continues to find problems with financial release conditions as well as no historical legal foundation for their use.

Does Cash Bail Deter Misconduct?
Cato Institute (Ouss & Stevenson), February 2024

Data & Methodology: The authors examined more than 22,000 criminal cases between 2007 and 2019 that fit the study criteria. A differences-in-differences methodology was used to account for shared variances within the data.

Analysis & Findings: The authors assessed the impact of a prosecutor-led “no-cash-bond” reform that applied to nearly two-thirds of all cases filed in Philadelphia, including misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies. They found “no evidence that financial collateral has a deterrent effect on failure-to-appear or pretrial crime.” These findings are in direct conflict with the primary justification for the use of financial conditions of pretrial release: that it incentivizes court appearance and law-abiding behavior.

Bail at the Founding
Harvard Law Review (Mayson & Funk), May 2024

Data & Methodology: This is a review of statutes, case law, legal treatises, and manuals for justices of the peace from the Founding era (approximately 1790 to 1810) and of secondary literature on Founding-era criminal procedures.

Analysis & Findings: This in-depth historical inquiry reveals that pretrial law in the Founding era prioritized pretrial liberty, essentially guaranteed release for nearly all accused people, and was comprised of a system of unsecured pledges, not cash deposits. These findings show how far modern pretrial release systems have shifted from foundational American legal principles.

Surveilling Sureties: How Privately Mediated Monetary Sanctions Enroll and Responsibilize Families 
Social Problems (Deckard), July 2024

Data & Methodology: This study analyzed ethnographic observations within a Harris County, Texas, bail bonding agency and in-depth interviews with bail bond cosigners.

Analysis & Findings: This paper examines the “responsibilization”— a process in which responsibilities shift from the state to individuals or communities—that occurs in pretrial systems that rely on the for-profit bail bond industry. Key points include the following:

• Agents selectively enroll people they perceive as suitable sureties and surveillants
• Monetary sanction is deployed with carceral and financial threats to encourage cosigners to embody surveillant roles
• Family members engage in invisible emotional labor to cope with their deployment as an arm of the state
• Family members inadvertently become subjects of surveillance and carceral control

The Short-Term Impacts of Bail Policy on Crime in Los Angeles
California Policy Lab (Sloan, Pickard, Lacoe, Bird, & Raphael), August 2024

Data & Methodology: This study used Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) arrest data for 2020–2023, LAPD crime report data for 2020–2024, and Los Angeles County (LA County) daily jail data for 2020–2023. The study employed an interrupted time series design and a regression discontinuity design.

Analysis & Findings: Starting in early 2020, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, LA County implemented emergency protocols that greatly reduced the use of secured financial conditions of pretrial release. The protocols were removed in July 2022, reinstated in May 2023, and adopted into the Pre-Arraignment Release Protocols in October 2023. These policy changes allowed researchers to analyze the impacts—if any—of the changes, using primarily comparative statistics. Researchers found that removing or reinstating the protocols did not have a statistically significant impact on the overall volume of crime reported or on total arrests; however, when financial conditions were in place, the local jail population increased.

Law enforcement agencies are beginning to seek alternative approaches to addressing mental health crisis calls.

The Status of Co-Responders in Law Enforcement: Findings from a National Survey of Law Enforcement Agencies
Policing: An International Journal (Uding, Moon, & Lum), October 2024

Data & Methodology: Study authors administered a novel survey to a nationally representative sample of local and state law enforcement agencies, with 568 agencies responding. Descriptive statistics were employed to assess the use and practices of crisis intervention and co-responder programs.

Analysis & Findings: Co-responder teams bring qualified mental or behavioral health professionals into emergency responses by the police. Researchers found that wide variation exists in the “staffing, operations, qualifications, characteristics and beliefs about the effectiveness of co-responder programs across the country.” Agencies face challenges due to the lack of standards and guidance for these initiatives.

As more states and local jurisdictions implement pretrial improvements, researchers are looking at trends and challenges to pretrial advancement and confirming there is no relationship between pretrial reform and crime trends.

Navigating Bail Reform in America: A State-by-State Overview
R Street Institute (Petis), March 2024

Data & Methodology: This study examined pretrial-related statutory laws and court rules.

Analysis & Findings: This analysis of pretrial reform laws nationwide highlights pretrial advancement trends and examines what future efforts at improvement may look like. It presents a number of key themes in recent changes, including pretrial assessments, ability-to-pay considerations, supportive pretrial services, and more.

When You’re a Hammer, Everything’s a Nail: Examining the “Progressive Prosecutor” Movement and Possibilities for Future Reform
Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts & Chicago Council of Lawyers, March 2024

Data & Methodology: Authors analyzed primary data collected through interviews as well as literature reviews and historical information from several years of research on prosecution in Cook County.

Analysis & Findings: This report identifies common approaches of “reform-oriented prosecutors”—that is,  prosecutors who seek to reduce mass incarceration and inequity through the power of their positions. These approaches  include “non-enforcement, diversion, decarceration, police accountability, reform of administrative practices, and advocacy for criminal legal system reforms.”

The authors synthesize their findings and interviews with scholars, policy experts, and system practitioners to generate six recommended goals for reform-oriented prosecutors to prioritize.

Challenges to Advancing Bail Reform: Lessons from Five States
Brennan Center for Justice (Wylie & Grawert), April 2024

Data & Methodology: Authors examined the mechanisms of change in places that altered pretrial policies to determine any lessons for successful reform.

Analysis & Findings: This report highlights five jurisdictions that undertook major changes to pretrial release policies and the ensuing outcomes. Due to political and cultural resistance to change and barriers to demonstrating rapid and clear success, three of the five jurisdictions rolled back reform efforts, and reforms led to unintended increases in pretrial detention in the other two. The authors provide lessons learned for future pretrial improvement efforts.

Gun Violence and Pretrial Detention—Addressing Public Perception and Public Health
JAMA Network Open (Brunson & Chillar), May 2024

Data & Methodology: Using synthetic control methods, the authors compared data on New Jersey’s rate of gun violence following the state’s 2017 pretrial reform with a matched comparison group of 36 jurisdictions that did not implement pretrial reform.

Analysis & Findings: No statistically significant changes were found in the rates of gun mortality or shootings following the implementation of pretrial reform in New Jersey. Specifically, the policy change did not result in an increase in gun violence at the community level, while the number of people held in pretrial detention decreased.

Bail Reform and Public Safety: Evidence from 33 Cities
Brennan Center for Justice (Craigie & Grawert), August 2024

Data & Methodology: The authors examined data from 33 U.S. cities—22 in which some reform had occurred and 11 with no reform activity. The report presents descriptive statistics and differences-in-difference analyses.

Analysis & Findings: The authors found “no statistically significant relationship between pretrial reform and crime rates. In other words, there is no reason to believe that pretrial reform has led to increased crime. This holds true even when focusing on major policy changes that have drawn public scrutiny, like those in New York and New Jersey.”

The First Year of the Pretrial Fairness Act
Loyola Chicago Center for Criminal Justice (Griffin, DuPont, Stemen, Olson, & Ward), September 2024

Data & Methodology: This evaluation used a mixed-methods approach to examine multiple processes and outcomes, including pre/post changes in the size and composition of jail populations, the lengths and costs of pretrial detention, rates and conditions of pretrial release, rates of failure to appear and new arrests during the pretrial period, overall case outcomes, and the work routines of criminal legal system stakeholders. Study authors also incorporated qualitative data from court observations, focus groups, and interviews.

Analysis & Findings: This report provides a snapshot of how Illinois’ pretrial detention and release practices and their decision making changed in the year since the Pretrial Fairness Act (PFA) came into effect and how these changes may explain the PFA’s successful outcomes. The authors are careful not to imply causation but note that crime in Illinois did not go up following implementation of the PFA. In fact, the statewide volume of reported crimes declined 11 percent—violent crime declined 7 percent, and property crime declined 14 percent—during the first six months the PFA was in effect.

Several studies examined various pretrial practices, including access to defense counsel and pretrial monitoring.

Can Less Restrictive Monitoring Be As Effective at Ensuring Compliance with Pretrial Release Conditions?: Evidence from Five Jurisdictions
MDRC (Anderson & Skemer), October 2024

Data & Methodology: This brief synthesized findings from three studies that employed methods including regression discontinuity design, randomized controlled trial, and propensity score matching. The studies analyzed data from five diverse jurisdictions ranging in size and including rural and urban areas.

Analysis & Findings: The three impact studies discussed in this brief each assessed the effectiveness of varying intensities and modes of pretrial monitoring at ensuring court appearances and preventing new arrests. Findings included:

• “Lower-intensity supervision was as effective as higher-intensity supervision in helping clients to appear in court and avoid new arrests”
• “Remote supervision was as effective as hybrid supervision in upholding levels of court appearance and avoidance of new felony charges”
• “Overall, being released on electronic monitoring or sobriety monitoring did not make people more likely to appear in court or avoid arrest”

Right to Counsel? A Mixed-Methods Evaluation of the St. Louis County Initial Appearance Program
Criminology & Public Policy (Morgan, Shamserad, & Huebner), May 2024

Data & Methodology: This evaluation of an initial appearance program in St. Louis County, Missouri, employed quantitative analysis, including multivariate regression, and qualitative research methods.

Analysis & Findings: Results demonstrate that early, free representation at arraignment can facilitate release on recognizance and lowered money bond amounts. Other findings suggest that this type of programming may help reduce some racial disparities and that courtroom stakeholders see overall value in the program.

Presumed Guilty: The Pretrial Incarceration Crisis in Los Angeles County
UCLA School of Law Pretrial Justice Clinic and La Defensa (Virani, Martinez, Alvarez, Boyle, Denny, Matthews, Narula, Silver, Rasaki, & Siguenza), June 2024

Data & Methodology: This court-watching and data analysis project (not a statistical analysis study) was conducted by a professor and students from the Pretrial Justice Clinic at the UCLA School of Law, as well as trained UCLA School of Law student volunteers. Court watchers, observing at two Los Angeles courthouses over the course of a month, collected information on pretrial release decisions to “better understand how judges are implementing pretrial release standards.”

Analysis & Findings: Court watchers documented demographic information, information regarding release conditions, and general observations. Findings included the following:

• Sixty-eight percent of people had a cash bond set; only 21 percent were released on recognizance
• In 77 percent of cases where a cash bond was set, judges did not consider a person’s ability to pay, in direct contradiction of state law
• Racial and ethnic disparities exist in the amount of money bond imposed
• People were released without additional conditions only 24 percent of the time

The authors suggest that greater measures are needed to protect the presumption of release and to prevent unnecessary detention.

Studies explored the potential harms related to detention and jail practices.

Share of Adult Suicides After Recent Jail Release
JAMA Network Open (Miller, Weinstock, Ahmedani, Carlson, Sperber, Lê Cook, Taxman, Arias, Kubiak, Dearing, Waehrer, Barrett, Hulsey, & Johnson), May 2024

Data & Methodology: Authors analyzed publicly available suicide death data and jail release data. They performed a meta-analysis of existing studies and employed multivariate statistical analyses.

Analysis & Findings: This study quantified the elevated risk of death by suicide for people released from jail at least once, typically after brief pretrial stays. It found that:

• “[T]he nearly 7.1 million US adults released from jail in 2019 accounted for 1 in 5 adult suicides”
• “27 percent of all adult suicide deaths occurred in formerly incarcerated individuals within two years of jail release, and 20 percent occurred within one year of release”

The authors suggest that an increased understanding of this population may support initiatives aimed at suicide screening and prevention.

The Perils of Late-Night Releases
Harvard Kennedy School, Malcolm Weiner Center for Social Policy (Smith, Vides-Gold, Phuong, & Nalbandian), June 2024

Data & Methodology: The authors combined publicly available general population data and jail population data. Information about late-night release was gathered from bail bonding records, jail websites, and phone/email interviews.

Analysis & Findings: This study found that releasing people from jail—many of whom are being detained pretrial—between midnight and 3:00 a.m. significantly increases their risks of causing harm or being harmed themselves. Particularly for the most vulnerable people—those with “class-based disadvantages and/or who are beset with often-untreated mental illnesses, substance use issues, and/or housing instability”—late-night releases pose logistical and safety challenges. The report also highlights jails that restrict late-night releases or that take steps to reduce their inherent risks.

Who Is Jailed, How Often, and Why: Our Jail Data Initiative Collaboration Offers a Fresh Look at the Misuse of Local Jails
Prison Policy Initiative (Widra & Sawyer), November 2024

Data & Methodology: Using data from the Jail Data Initiative, which includes daily county jail rosters in over 1,300 counties, researchers used descriptive statistics to form a macro view of how jails are used.

Analysis & Findings: The following are some key findings:

• More than 5.6 million people are jailed annually; 20 percent are jailed more than once in a year
• Racial disparities in jail admissions are seen in repeated bookings
• More than 40 percent of people experiencing homelessness who are booked into jail are booked more than once in a year
• Most jail bookings are not for “violent” charges

The United States is unique in the manner and scope of its reliance on financial conditions of pretrial release. Many other nations, however, release people before trial with orders to return to court and abide by specified conditions. International research on pretrial compliance, like this study from Australia, may offer insight into alternatives to financial conditions.

Complex Lives and Procedural Barriers: Detainees’ “Life Happens” Explanations for Breaching Orders
Journal of Criminology (Gately, Rock, Finney, & Parry), June 2024

Data & Methodology: This project used the “Drug Use Monitoring in Australia—Western Australia (DUMA-WA) collection to survey 230 police detainees about their orders and reasons for breaching recent orders.”

Analysis & Findings: Researchers explored the reasons behind people’s breach of pretrial release conditions, with the goal of understanding how to prevent such breaches. Homelessness, family responsibilities, employment, and procedural challenges were identified as primary barriers to adhering to release conditions.

The following strategies to address barriers to compliance were outlined:

• Move from standardized to individualized conditions, ensuring that conditions are achievable for the person
• Include contingencies or alternatives to reporting when barriers arise
• Establish a specific court outreach service, including court date reminders and a dedicated phone number for people to call when they are having trouble attending court and would like an extension or alternative court date or reporting method