Marxist San Francisco DA Implements No Bail & Curtails Pretrial Detention

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Last week, San Francisco’s newly elected district attorney, Chesa Boudin, released his office’s new bail policy. Following his campaign promise, the new policy forbids prosecutors from requesting money bail under any circumstances. In addition, it allows them to request pretrial jail time only for people who face certain violent charges and who prosecutors believe pose a high risk of violence or flight.

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Boudin has adopted what is easily the most progressive prosecutor bail policy in the country. His reforms are more comprehensive and transparent than those adopted by other leading progressive prosecutors, such as Boston’s Rachael Rollins and Philadelphia’s Larry Krasner, let alone those of DAs elsewhere in the country.

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prosecutors in his office can never request money bail, and they can never defend someone’s incarceration on money bail. That’s a big shift in policy that should enable many people to avoid jail pretrial.

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money bail is not the only mechanism for jailing people pretrial. In many states, including California, a judge — often acting on a prosecutor’s recommendation — can determine that a person is dangerous or is a flight risk and order that person to be jailed until the criminal case is over. Boudin’s policy restricts when this can happen. It sets a presumption against it, and enables prosecutors to recommend pretrial detention only for people facing charges for certain violent felonies. And they can do that only if the prosecutor is convinced that the person has a “substantial likelihood” of committing “great bodily harm” or fleeing the jurisdiction if released.

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Boudin’s policy prevents prosecutors from recommending pretrial detention without supervisor approval, in an effort to foster the presumption against it.

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