Aggravated vehicular homicide. Manufacturing methamphetamine. Heroin sales.
These are all crimes that come Jan. 1, the police will no longer be able to make a custodial arrest for. Officers, instead, will have to issue desk appearance tickets for the charges and the suspects will be on their way out the door, back onto community streets without pretrial detention.
New York State’s bail system was overhauled April 1 with the passage of the Bail Elimination Act in the 2020 state budget. Cash bail will be eliminated for misdemeanors and non-violent (Class E) felonies, and as a result, according to the governor’s office, approximately 90 percent of suspects would remain out of jail before their initial court appearance.
“A person will still be arrested just like they would have in the past,” State Sen. Patrick Gallivan said. “The difference would be though, what is a police officer authorized to do following the arrest. Unless it’s one of the qualifying offenses, that police officer must issue an appearance ticket, as opposed to bringing the person before a judge for the purpose of arraigning that person and possibly setting bail.”
The full story from the Country Courier is HERE.
