Recently, we are hearing a lot about the SAFE-T Act that was put into law in 2023. As a former lawyer who dealt with people charged with various crimes, I have always had mixed feelings on this act. On the one hand, a person is presumed innocent until a court or jury finds differently. If he is truly innocent, he may have spent months behind bars before trial.

If a person has adequate funds or a bail bondsman steps in, he is released pending an outcome. Not exactly fair to the innocent but poor defendant who cannot raise the money. Those charged are not always guilty. So, one side of the argument for the act was to treat all defendants equally, regardless of their financial ability.

On the other hand, when cash bail was done away with, it became the duty of the judge to weigh all the facts and decide if he could be released. It had nothing to do with setting a bond. After all, the bond was merely a guarantee of the defendant returning for his case, or his money is kept by the court, and a search begins to find him.

But even under the new act, judges are supposed to weigh such factors as safety to the community, perhaps safety to the alleged victim, as well as the disappearance of the defendant.

Two cases of release have come to my attention. The first is obviously the setting on fire of an innocent woman riding a train in Chicago. The man alleged to have set her on fire was on such a release. Lawrence Reed had been arrested 72 times since he was 18. His latest arrest was for aggravated battery against a hospital worker. He was released with an electronic monitoring device that was supposedly watched by the judicial department with professional monitors. That device in no way showed a violation when he merely got on a train, but his freedom allowed him to commit a horrendous crime. The prosecution had informed the judge of his prior behavior, but he was released despite it. Could this judge foresee this crime? Well, his public defender argued that he needed release to deal with his mental health issues! Isn’t this a red flag?

Then there is the other type of release where the action of the defendant is known, and yet he is still released. In a recent filing in Cook County, the family of a murdered woman is suing the county and the monitoring company for their failure to protect this woman. The victim was stabbed multiple times by her husband. The charge for which he was originally arrested and detained was making threats against his wife. He was ordered to stay away from her and wear a monitoring device. Despite the order, the monitoring company had received 20 calls of his violation and 90 messages from the device that he was violating his order. After killing his wife, he then committed suicide.

I do believe that some people charged with certain crimes should be permitted to be released from confinement while awaiting trial, but the judges have been too lenient in who they let loose in the public. While it is unfair to pretrial a defendant, these hearings for potential release under the Pretrial Fairness Act, a part of the SAFE-T Act, must consider more of the facts before a release. Certainly, this last case is a prime example of a man with a history of threats to his wife who is then released pretrial when the new charges point to a repeated threat to his wife.

The second part that is being criticized is the quality of the monitoring. In the case of the husband, proximity to certain areas should be clearly noticed and followed up on. In the other case, the monitoring could well have shown him on the train, but that might not have raised any concern, yet violence occurred.

The prior criminal record should be a huge factor in denying release. The nature of the crime should be just as important. A released drunk driver may drink again and then put all of us in jeopardy, but it is a minor crime and he will be released. A released bank robber may commit another robbery, but he may not, especially if he is innocent of the charge and has no prior history. To do it again would lock up his future.

Violence against a particular person or group should raise a huge flag not to release this man. And if there was cash bail again, his ability to raise the money should not be the only consideration of his release. There is no way the arsonist should have been released. There is little reason to release the wife-killer before trial under either cash bail or the SAFE-T Act.

In the end, I must agree with our Kankakee County State’s Attorney and our Sheriff that this act is totally wrong and cash bail by itself is not much better. We elect these judges, and we should put the burden on them to make the best decision in each case after they have all the facts. Sure, some innocent people may sit in jail, but we have learned that our system of justice has its flaws even after conviction by a jury. A lot of innocent people have spent years in jail. A few months in the local county jail is no comparison.