Houston police chief calls on courts to ‘stop pussyfooting’ after second officer-involved shooting (excerpt from Fox 26 9/16/19) HOUSTON (FOX 26) – Houston’s police chief called on Harris County criminal courts to “stop pussyfooting” after another officer involved shooting Monday morning left a suspect dead. Chief art Acevedo voiced his frustrationRead More →
New Harris County Misdemeanor Court Guidelines Under Fire After Murder of Pregnant Wife Harris county officials are still giddy over new bail guidelines even after it was revealed that accused murderer Alex Guajardo was first released for free under new bail rules after assaulting his wife only to then tragicallyRead More →
Local group says public safety is at risk if bail system isn’t fixed (excerpt from KHOU 11 Aug 6 2019) After a pregnant woman was recently stabbed to death by her husband who was out on bond, a local group says the bail system needs to be fixed. HOUSTON —Read More →
Texas: El Paso County Creates a Risk Assessment Shred-a-Thon Under Threat of Litigation as Momentum Against Pretrial Risk Assessment Continues to Grow On October 1, 2018, El Paso County implemented its new bail policy. El Paso’s new policy is based on the use of a risk assessment tool and theRead More →
Another Wave of Opposition Against Pretrial Risk Assessments as the Texas Legislature Steams Forward House Bill 2020 is making its way through the legislature. We certainly support all efforts to increase the information judges have in making decisions and the other important changes that the bill would make to theRead More →
Texas: Thoughts On The Preventative Detention Constitutional Amendment, HJR 62 House Joint Resolution 62 proposes “a constitutional amendment authorizing the denial of bail to an accused person if necessary to ensure the person’s appearance in court and the safety of the community and the victim of the alleged offense.” AsRead More →
Texas Public Policy Foundation‘s Criticism of Governor Abbott Misplaced—Dallas District Attorney’s New Policy Is a License to Steal Recall, Dallas District Attorney John Cruezot is not going to prosecute thefts under $750 for those necessary items, in addition to not prosecuting some weed and some other low-level offenses. Governor AbbotRead More →
Bail Reform Goes Off the Rails in Dallas and Harris County, Texas Rich people can afford their bail and poor people can’t—the holy grail of bail slogans, jingles, catchphrases, watchwords, and mantras—is the heart of how criminal justice public policy is being designed these days. Even as scholarly research debunksRead More →
Let judges handle bail, and keep Texas safer (excerpt from TribTalk – Texas and authored by Former U.S. Representative Ted Poe, Mar 12 2019) In order for any criminal justice system to work properly, justice must mean something to the offender, to the victim and to the community. Justice cannotRead More →
Texas: Bipartisan Opposition Continues to Mount Against the Whitmire-Hecht Bail Reform Plan As Texas Senator Whitmire and Chief Justice Nathan Hecht keep pushing to eliminate the constitutional right to bail in Texas (a right the Chief Justice swore to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution and laws of the UnitedRead More →
