NCJ Number
125170
Journal
Temple Law Review Volume: 62 Issue: 4 Dated: (Winter 1989) Pages: 1225-1260
Date Published
1989
Length
36 pages
Annotation
The United States v. Salerno, 481 U.S. 739 (1987), case decision justifying Federal preventive detention is a significant American decision.
Abstract
Preventive detention is the pretrial detention of individuals based on a prediction of future criminal or dangerous behavior. An historic and ingrained understanding that the presumption of innocence proscribes preventive detention and compels bail for the untried accused is one of the paramount features of the criminal justice system. In the Salerno decision, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the facial validity of the Bail Reform Act of 1984, which approved pretrial detention of "dangerous" indictees and brought American criminal procedure closer to the crime control and inquisitorial models. For the first time, the Court approved the civil law feature of pretrial detention for adults accused of criminal offenses, solely on predictions of dangerousness and without considerations of risk of flight or threat to governmental witnesses, jurors, or authority, but failed to establish any maximum limitation for the period of detention. The alteration of the balance between government and its citizens accused of crime is fundamental and profound. 249 notes, 1 table.