As APPR’s national research partner, RTI International (RTI) independently studies the six Research-Action Sites receiving intensive technical assistance through APPR. RTI recently published “The Benefits of Early Release from Pretrial Detention.”
The study examined 31,740 cases of people booked into jail across three counties in two states, comparing the outcomes of those detained 1 day or less to those detained more than 1, 3, or 7 days. It found a significant relationship between longer detention and worse pretrial outcomes.
We spoke with Matthew DeMichele, Senior Director of RTI’s Center for Criminal Legal Systems Research and Project Director of RTI’s APPR research team, about the benefits of early pretrial release. DeMichele’s coauthors include Ian A. Silver, Ryan Labrecque, Stephen Tueller, and Pamela K. Lattimore.
APPR: Tell us about your findings and how this research brief contributes to the body of research that supports the benefits of early pretrial release.
Dr. DeMichele: The study allows us to examine what we hope to achieve from pretrial detention. Theoretically, pretrial detention is expected to reduce missed court appearances and new arrests. These benefits are anticipated by incapacitating and deterring people. Specifically, holding people in jail prevents them from missing court or being re-arrested. And it is hoped that the threat of going back to jail will deter people from missing court or committing new crimes.
What we found, however, is the opposite. We discovered that pretrial detention has a criminogenic effect—meaning that the longer someone is held pretrial, the more likely they are to have negative outcomes compared to those who are released.
The findings are profound. We learned that being detained longer resulted in a 39 percent increase in the likelihood of someone being rearrested for any new crime and a 31 percent increase in the likelihood of someone being arrested for a new violent crime.
Not only is pretrial detention associated with increases in new arrests, but we also found that it is related to a 31 percent increase in the likelihood of someone missing a court hearing.
Learning that pretrial detention may worsen outcomes for individuals provides an opportunity to rethink the use and expectations of pretrial detention.
APPR: How did you compare people held for different lengths of pretrial detention?
Dr. DeMichele: Our study used advanced statistical approaches to ensure that we compared similar individuals detained for at least 7 days to those detained for less than 1 day.
Because the people detained and released have different criminal histories, we needed to use a series of statistical techniques to make sure that we were comparing similar groups. We used a type of statistical matching called inverse probability weighting.
Then we used what is known as a “natural experiment” to create a pre- and post-detention comparison (called difference-in-differences). This approach is referred to as a natural experiment because we simply took advantage of the existing—or natural—conditions, and didn’t need to vary anything on our own.
“Learning that pretrial detention may worsen outcomes for individuals provides an opportunity to rethink the use and expectations of pretrial detention.”
While there are a lot of details to this approach, basically, we designed a study to compare similar people to get at the overall (or average) effects of pretrial detention. In the end, we compared people detained for 1 day or less to people with similar criminal histories, offense types, offense levels and number of charges, and demographic characteristics to similarly matched people detained for more than 1, 3, and 7 days.
When comparing similarly situated people, the detained group had higher rates of missed court appearances, higher rates of arrests for a new crime, and higher rates of arrests for a new violent crime.
APPR: Why do pretrial detention and the length of detention contribute to worse outcomes for people and communities?
Dr. DeMichele: The critical question we’re trying to answer now is why do we find these results? Why is pretrial detention associated with worse outcomes?
For criminologists, the findings are not all that surprising. In fact, a large amount of research shows that prisons don’t deter future crimes either. Rather, time in prison is often associated with more crimes after release.
For the general public, these results might seem counterintuitive. Most people wouldn’t think pretrial detention would make things worse.
Jails, of course, are different from prisons in many ways. Jails are known to be chaotic due to the constant cycling of people in and out of them. It might surprise some readers to know that surveys and interviews with justice-involved people find that jails are known to be more punitive than prisons, with most people preferring to serve time in prisons rather than jails.
This prior research helps us understand why pretrial detention may be related to worse outcomes. Pretrial detention destabilizes people. Many people admitted to jails have vulnerable lives before going in, and jails make things worse for them by separating them from their families, their jobs if they have one, and their normal activities. If someone is on medication, they may not get it in jail.
Simply, going to jail poses many challenges for people that make it more likely that they may become further involved with criminal activity and avoid appearing in court.
I want to be clear that I am not saying that pretrial detention should be eliminated. Pretrial detention may be appropriate in some situations.
APPR: For people working in pretrial systems, what do you hope they take from this research?
Dr. DeMichele: Jails are an unfortunate yet necessary part of contemporary society. They provide important social functions by detaining people accused of serious crimes and those who pose a danger to communities. And I think they should continue to do that, but I also think we’re at a place where pretrial detention is being overused.
Although most people cycle through jails very quickly, we have nearly 400,000 people who are held in jails before trial, which is about two-thirds of the national jail population. We need tools to help us identify the subset of people breaking the law who should be incarcerated in jail.
The findings from the pretrial detention study dovetail nicely with other research we’ve completed that demonstrates the usefulness of assessments. Assessment tools can be used to understand how likely someone is to attend court or remain arrest-free. These tools can help us identify the types of services and conditions someone might need to be successful upon release.
I would say to people working in the system that we’re unlikely to improve the benefits of pretrial detention by continuing to do what we’ve always done. Again, I think this and other research should be seen as a way for us to reflect upon what we’ve been doing, identify what we want, and refocus our actions to achieve realistic goals for pretrial detention.
The status quo is to base release decisions on one’s ability to pay a financial condition. For me, that begs the question: Why would we allow someone’s ability to post money to determine if they are released or not? If we want people to show up to court and not commit crimes while in the community, it seems to me that we should base release decisions on their ability to come to court and to stay out of trouble, not on whether they can afford to pay.
Making release decisions is difficult. Every day, judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys, and pretrial staff are exposed to difficult situations that require difficult decisions. We’re not saying we have all the answers. Instead, I see our research as a learning opportunity to support system actors, and we appreciate the opportunity to work with the APPR sites.
RTI International conducted the study The Benefits of Early Release From Pretrial Detention with support from the philanthropy Arnold Ventures.