Courtney Oliva

Cost of Discretion: Judicial Decision-Making, Pretrial Detention, and Public Safety in New York City By Oded Oren, Chad M. Topaz, and Courtney Machi Oliva Key Findings: An analysis of public pretrial data from 2020-2022 reveals that some New York City judges are disproportionately carceral, i.e., these judges are substantially more likely to order pretrial detention than their peers, even when accounting for factors such as the severity of the case and the defendant’s prior criminal history.

Our recent report, “Cost of Discretion,” reveals that from 2020 to 2022, the pretrial decisions made by New York City’s fourteen most carceral judges resulted in an estimated 580 additional people detained, 154 extra years of pretrial detention, and over $77 million in costs to taxpayers.