Michael Hiltzik: Facing eradication, the bail industry gears up to mislead the public about its value
Few businesses enjoy a reputation for providing a public service as inflated as the bail bond industry.
To hear bail agents talk, they're virtually the only people who can protect innocent communities from violent chaos perpetrated by defendants let out of jail before trial. "The most effective form of release in terms of ensuring appearance at court were releases on a financially secured bail bond," the American Bail Coalition, the industry's trade group, says on its website.
In California, the business of issuing bail bonds for profit is under attack as it is nowhere else in the nation. With the signature of then-Gov. Jerry Brown on a bill dubbed SB 10 in 2018, the state outlawed cash bail for criminal defendants. SB 10 created a new system allowing judges much greater discretion in setting terms of pretrial release for all but the most violent defendants.
Other states have remade their pretrial systems to reduce the role of cash bail, but none has yet gone as far as California.
"Were SB 10 to become
