Personal Liberty and Community Safety: Pretrial Release in the Criminal Court

• NCJ Number: 155842
• Author(s): J S Goldkamp; M R Gottfredson; P R Jones; D Weiland
• Date Published: 1995
• Length: 366 pages
• Sale Source: Plenum Press
• Publication Type: Survey
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: The Plenum Series in Crime and Justice

Annotation

This book discusses an initiative undertaken by courts in Boston, Miami, and Phoenix to examine pretrial release decisionmaking and to develop policy about the use of pretrial discretion.

Abstract

The study addresses issues concerning the central judicial role in pretrial release and detention. The first section of the book introduces the issues and problems at the core of the judicial exercise of pretrial release decisionmaking in the U.S. The second section outlines the court systems in the three jurisdictions included in the research. In the third section, the authors review the construction of the pretrial decision guidelines that were implemented at each of the three sites and estimate the effect those guidelines would have if successfully executed. The final sections describe the initial effects of the guidelines in each of the cities and integrate findings to draw conclusions about the promise of the self-help guidelines strategy as a resource for the judicial reform of pretrial release. Chapter notes, 1 appendix, and 92 references