County Council calls for new tool to increase public safety and guide pretrial release decisions

October 25, 2010

Summary

Adopted legislation also requests review of criteria used when releasing criminal defendants into community alternative programs

Story

In an effort to increase public safety, the Metropolitan King County Council today adopted legislation calling for the development of a risk assessment tool for making release decisions for criminal defendants awaiting trial. Supplementing the information currently available to judges, the risk assessment tool will help identify defendants likely to pose a danger to public safety or to be a flight risk. The tool will aid the courts when making decisions about whether and on what conditions to release criminal defendants prior to trial or sentencing.

“Preserving public safety is one of King County’s core functions. A validated pretrial risk assessment tool is an emerging best practice that will help ensure the right folks are released,” said Council Chair Bob Ferguson, who sponsored the legislation and serves on the statewide Bail Practices and Procedures Work Group. “Some of the most important public safety decisions being made every day are judges’ decisions regarding the release of criminal defendants. We need to make sure judges have the best tools available when they make these decisions.”

In King County, judges have the option of sending pretrial criminal defendants to alternative to detention programs, which include electronic home detention, work education release, and day reporting programs. Approximately 1,400 convicted and alleged criminal offenders are participating in alternative to detention programs every day.

Today’s legislation also requests the courts to consider establishing eligibility requirements for these programs. State law governs eligibility for who can participate in alternative programs after sentencing, prohibiting individuals who have been convicted of a violent or sex offense. However, there are no uniform eligibility conditions for pretrial defendants. Which pretrial defendants participate in these programs is up to the individual judge in each case. The Council will be notified of the status of any screening criteria adopted by the courts by March 1, 2011.

Finally, the legislation directs the Department of Adult and Juvenile Detention to provide better information on the pretrial criminal defendants being sent to the county’s alternative to detention programs. Currently, a comprehensive review and evaluation of the alternative to detention programs is hindered by the fact that data is not readily available or easily accessible in a single system.

“Having timely and accurate information about the people released through our alternative to detention programs is critical,” said Ferguson. “County policy makers must be able to evaluate these programs and ensure they are achieving the desired outcomes of reducing recidivism, decreasing the failure to appear rate, and increasing accountability for offenders.”

Prosecuting Attorney Dan Satterberg supports the development of a pretrial risk assessment tool, and the ordinance follows up on a number of recent reports that recommended adoption of a pretrial risk assessment tool in King County. According to these reports, the benefits of the tool include:

• Reducing the likelihood of biases that result in disproportionate confinement of minorities or other groups;
• Increasing efficiency by better organizing intake reports, and;
• Protecting public safety by identifying higher risk defendants.

Both the development of a pretrial risk assessment tool and the effort to gather additional data on the participants of the county’s alternative to detention programs will be grant-funded. King County received an Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant, which providers federal funding to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of criminal justice systems of state and local jurisdictions.


The adopted ordinance advances the Council’s priority of Safe, Healthy and Vibrant Communities.