The Bail Project

At work, Nakedra often thinks about how little it can take to change the course of someone’s day. “You could be the only smile a person sees all day,” she said. “You could be the only inspirational conversation that a person has. You could change a person’s life in five seconds.” Nakedra, 38, lives in Crestview, Florida, and works as a manager at Dunkin’.

What does the presumption of innocence mean if you can be jailed before trial simply because you cannot afford bail? A legal principle that every person accused of any crime is considered innocent until proven guilty. – Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law School In other words, an accusation is not a conviction. The government must prove a person’s guilt. Until then, that person is presumed innocent.

Jacqueline reached a point where turning herself in could mean losing her children. She had multiple warrants in Tulsa, Oklahoma – two assault cases and a failure-to-pay charge. To resolve them, she would likely have to go to jail first. She did not have money for a lawyer. She did not have money for bail. She did not have money for a lawyer. She did not have money for bail. And she had no one who could take care of her children if she were detained. “I got hit with a crossroads,” she said.

At 27, Austin’s life was already full. Born and raised in Tulsa, his days revolved around getting his kids to school, working, and playing semipro football on weekends. He was building something steady: a routine, a family life, a future. Then, an arrest interrupted everything. Austin’s bail was set at $1,000 – an amount that, for many families, equals rent or more. It was not money he or his family had.

Terry says he spent years building a life that didn’t belong to him. At 48, the former electrician describes himself as a “journeyman for real” – a nomad who traded the constraints of traditional employment for a truck, a trailer, and a small family of cats. He calls his journey a quest for “unprogramming,” a way to live in remote landscapes where he could finally escape the feeling of being constantly monitored and controlled.

When people think about the War on Drugs, they often picture long prison sentences: mandatory minimums, three-strikes laws, federal prosecutions, and decades behind bars. But one of its most devastating impacts happens much earlier—before trial, before conviction, and often before a person has had any meaningful chance to defend themselves. The War on Drugs did not simply change who went to prison.

Thomas was finally back on the road. After years of addiction, homelessness, and instability, he had rebuilt his life one mile at a time. He had his commercial driver’s license (CDL) again. He was working. He was sober. “I was blessed with being able to go back to CDL school and get my CDL back,” he said. “I was gaining jobs and keeping my sobriety.” Driving was more than a job. It was proof that his life was moving forward. The trouble began with what felt like a small thing.

Published in The New York Times, Manager of Communications Devin McMahon writes in this Letter To The Editor (LTE) that the effort to criminalize abortion will disproportionately devastate working-class women, who lack the financial resources of wealthy individuals to bypass abortion bans or pay the cash bail required to avoid pretrial incarceration.

For years, California courts have kept people in jail by setting bail at amounts they could never afford. A judge might say someone was eligible for release, then attach a $50,000 or $100,000 price tag that guaranteed they would remain behind bars. The California Supreme Court has now said that practice violates the state constitution.

Two-thousand five hundred dollars was the price set between Taylor and the rest of her life. For the 32-year-old case manager in Arizona’s East Valley, that number was a lesson in how cash bail works. It decided whether a lapse of judgement would pass or become something larger – whether she would go home or go to jail. Taylor had just signed a lease on a new apartment last October. She went to Walmart to buy what she needed to furnish it. “Just regular household items,” she said.