On Day 26 of our countdown to the #StandUp4HumanRightsCT rally on September 8, we will be focusing on Article 11 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which guarantees that an individual will be presumed innocent until proven guilty.
The article reads: (1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.
(2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.
Presumed innocence until proven culpability is one of the foundational principles in the United States justice system, primarily protected by the Sixth Amendment guarantee to a “speedy and public trial with an impartial jury” and Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. Yet this fundamental notion is continually challenged by the modern money bail system. What began as a process to provide defendants with an incentive to return to court following release has evolved into an institution that disproportionately preys on the financially disadvantaged. Money bail neglects the doctrine of presumed innocence, instead prioritizing the ownership of capital and unjustly punishing and imprisoning those that personally lack it. 70% of jailed Americans are pretrial, which means that there are hundreds of thousands of citizens spending weeks, months, and at times, years in jailhouses— separated from their families and unable to work— despite still being considered innocent in the eyes of the law.
In its current form, the money bail system allows for the monetary exploitation of society’s most vulnerable and targeted populations, plummeting them into seemingly never-ending cycles of debt and dependency. The ACLU’s Campaign for Smart Justice reports that the national average for bail for a felony arrest is now $10,000, despite the Federal Reserve calculating that nearly half of Americans would be incapable of paying an unanticipated expense of $400 or higher. Statistics like this illustrate the desperation that many defendants face upon arrest, explaining why the private bail bond industry continues to thrive to this day.
In 2017, significant changes were made in Connecticut to rectify the harms of the money bail system. The Connecticut state legislature ended the practice of “cash only” bail, prohibited the assignment of money bail for misdemeanor charges, and decreased the time between first and second court appearance dates for misdemeanor charges by 16 days, making it one of the few states in the nation to make such advances.
Why does the presumption of innocence matter to you, and how do you think we can protect it? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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Be sure to spread the word about the celebratory rally on September 8th! This will be a great venue for you to hear from leaders in the local activist sphere, network with others, and find ways to personally affect community change!