DANIEL BICE

Bice: U.S. Senate candidate Mandela Barnes favors eliminating cash bail nationally, aide says

Daniel Bice
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Amid the recent furor over major crimes apparently committed by defendants out on low bail, Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes is standing his ground. 

Barnes, the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate, once sponsored a bill to end cash bail in the state.

The 2016 measure would have barred judges from using the "nature, number and gravity" of the charges as the sole reason to hold a defendant before trial. Instead, a judge would be required to release a defendant unless there was "clear and convincing evidence" that a defendant was a flight risk or a danger to an individual or a witness.

In a statement, Barnes' campaign said he remains firmly in support of his proposed legislation, which didn't make it out of committee. His campaign likened the plan to one adopted in New Jersey under Republican Gov. Chris Christie.

President Joe Biden has also said he would like to end cash bail, though he's taken no real steps to do that

If elected to the U.S. Senate later this year, Barnes would even support a bill to eliminate the use of cash bail nationwide, his aide said. The federal justice system does not use cash bail as a condition of a defendant's pre-trial release.

"The lieutenant governor believes we should decide who is imprisoned before their trial begins based on how much of a risk they pose to the community, not on how much money they have," Maddy McDaniel, spokeswoman for Barnes' campaign, said in response to a series of questions from the Journal Sentinel.

But that's not all. 

The Milwaukee Democrat also pushed a bill in 2016 that would have lowered the penalty for bail-jumping in certain instances. 

Under Barnes' plan, if defendants facing felony charges violated the terms of their release before trial, they would be hit with a misdemeanor if they did not commit a new crime while on the lam. The penalty now would be an additional felony charge. 

McDaniel said he still supports this proposal. The campaign declined to make Barnes available for an interview to discuss his views on criminal justice reform. 

The former two-term lawmaker's campaign responded to questions on these issues just months after Darrell Brooks, 39, was released on $1,000 bail five days before the parade attack that killed six and injured more than 60.

Brooks was free on bail in a case in which he was charged with punching and running over the mother of his child with the same SUV he is accused of using to kill and injure those at the parade. Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm’s office released a statement saying a prosecutor had recommended an “inappropriately low” $1,000 bail in Brooks’ earlier felony domestic violence case. 

Brooks has been charged with six counts of first-degree intentional homicide

That is just one of several recent Milwaukee County cases in which defendants released on low bail have been accused of major criminal acts, including domestic homicide and shooting a police officer. 

These incidents have stoked widespread outrage, much of it directed at Chisholm, and prompted proposals to change bail policy in Wisconsin.

McDaniel said Barnes' proposals are aimed at making sure no individual can get out of jail by paying a certain amount of cash. 

"Dangerous individuals like Darrell Brooks shouldn’t be able to get out of prison by paying $1,000 or $100,000," McDaniel said. "The bottom line is money shouldn’t have anything to do with public safety."

Asked if Barnes has advised Gov. Tony Evers to fire Chisholm, as some individuals have suggested, McDaniel said, "The lieutenant governor believes that’s a decision best left to voters."

Others aren't so sure his plans would keep the state's streets safe. 

“Not only does Mandela Barnes oppose holding bad actors like John Chisholm accountable, but he wants to enable more violent criminals like Darrell Brooks to walk free via reckless cash bail policies," said Anna Kelly, spokeswoman for the Republican Party.

"Unlike Barnes, Wisconsinites don’t have access to taxpayer-funded private security," Kelly said, "and after Wisconsinites watched the Waukesha attack in horror, his views couldn’t be more out of touch with the mainstream, and they’re disqualifying for the U.S. Senate.”

Johnson just recently came out against the nomination of Milwaukee County Court Judge William Pocan, accusing him of granting low bail to people accused of violent offenses. 

Other Democrats in race stop short of backing elimination of bail

Barnes' top opponents in the U.S. Senate race aren't on board with him on totally eliminating cash bail as a condition of pretrial release. The winner of the Democratic primary in August will take on U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson in November.  

State Treasurer Sarah Godlewski said cash bail should remain in place for violent crimes or dangerous, repeat offenders. But Godlewski said she did favor reforming the system for those charged with committing "non-violent, minor infractions."

"We need the courts and police focused on serious dangerous crimes, and we don’t want to over-prosecute small infractions," said Sarah Abel, spokeswoman for Godlewski.

Outagamie County Executive Tom Nelson staked out a similar position.  

"Bail needs to be reformed, not abolished," Nelson said. There must be bail reform of some kind because the current system is effectively a debtors' prison."

In his county, Nelson said, officials use what they call "evidence-based decision making."  The judiciary works with the criminal justice treatment services staff, he said, to determine the risk level of defendants and make decisions as a result.

Nelson said the program has the support of both Republicans and Democrats. 

Milwaukee Bucks executive Alex Lasry said he believes there is inherent inequality in the current system. 

Lasry said people who pose no danger to the community should not be held in jail just because they can't afford to pay their bail. But those arrested for violent crimes should not be released no matter how much money they can post. 

"It’s very clear that the current system isn’t working," Lasry said.

Later, a Lasry spokesman for the campaign said now is not the time to eliminate cash bail. The focus should be, the Lasry spokesman said, on reducing the number of dangerous people on the street. 

None of the three candidates supported Barnes' proposal to reduced the penalty for bail-jumping. 

"NO," Nelson wrote. 

The debate over cash bail is being played out nationally. 

Barnes' campaign points to the results in New Jersey, which allowed more people to remain free while awaiting time by eliminating cash bail in most instances.  

In the year after making these changes in 2017, one study said, 95% of defendants were released pretrial and 89% of them appeared at their trial date.

In addition, California did away with cash bail for people who couldn’t afford it last year, and Illinois became the first state in the country to do away with it entirely. That change takes effect next year. 

But Wisconsin lawmakers are pushing measures to bolster the cash bail system in the wake of a spate of major crimes apparently committed by defendants released on low bail. 

In all, lawmakers have submitted 10 proposals to alter the terms of pretrial release in Wisconsin. 

One constitutional amendment proposed by Republicans would require Wisconsin judges to factor in defendants’ charges, criminal record and public safety risk in setting cash bail. Right now, judges are to determine the amount of bail based on whether a defendant is a flight risk or a danger to society. 

Another would set minimum bail amounts for criminals who have already been convicted of a felony or violent misdemeanor.

"Wisconsin lives are in danger because of the low bail that soft-on-crime judges and DAs are currently setting," said Sen. Julian Bradley, a Franklin Republican who is co-sponsor of that legislation. "This revolving door for criminals must end." 

But John Gross of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School told the Kenosha News this month that Wisconsin is moving in a different direction from other states eliminating or restricting the use of bail. 

“They’re not seeing spikes in recidivism, their costs are down and public safety is at the same level, but more people are out on the street,” he said. “And so I feel like Wisconsin is bucking the trend here.”

Contact Daniel Bice at (414) 313-6684 or dbice@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter @DanielBice or on Facebook at fb.me/daniel.bice.