Balancing Promise And Caution In Pretrial Risk Assessments

Across the country, release and detention decisions for defendants in the pretrial period —that is, the period after arrest while a criminal case is being adjudicated — are increasingly guided by risk assessments, which rely on data to estimate defendants’ risk of failing to appear for a court date or of being charged with new criminal activity if released pending trial. A risk assessment is generally used by a judicial body to help determine whether a defendant will be released while waiting for a case to be resolved, and if so, under what conditions (these are the defendant’s release conditions). The goal of pretrial risk assessments is to make any restrictions imposed on a defendant’s liberty better align with the risk that person poses to the community