Chicago Police Superintendent Wrongfully Blames Gun Violence on Bond Reform

Criminal Justice ,

On July 6, 2020, new Chicago Police Department Superintendent David Brown held a press conference about the Fourth of July weekend’s gun violence. Between 6 PM on Thursday, July 2, and 5 AM on Monday, July 6, 87 people were shot in the city, and 17 of those people died. Tragically, the victims shot included 13 children and a 7-year-old girl was among those killed. Gun violence deaths on the South and West Sides of Chicago—especially the deaths of children—are a constant reminder of work our city must do to curb the root causes of violence in our neighborhoods.

It was incredibly disappointing to see Superintendent Brown fall back on his Department’s long-standing but disproven claim that bond reform is somehow to blame for gun violence in Chicago. Brown repeatedly stated that “keeping violent offenders in jail longer” and “revamping the electronic monitoring system” will reduce violence, but a quick look at the numbers proves these claims are no more true this year than they were any other: 

  • First, the number of accused people incarcerated in jail this year is the same as it was last year. Cook County detains people accused of crimes in two ways: some are imprisoned behind bars in the Cook County Jail and others are confined to their homes on draconian 24/7 house arrest with electronic monitoring (EM). Violations of the Court’s terms for pretrial house arrest are Class 3 felonies, which are carefully tracked by the Cook County Sheriff’s Office. This year—because of the public health concerns caused by COVID-19—a larger proportion of accused people are imprisoned in their homes on EM than last year. Despite this shift in location, the total number of people incarcerated pretrial in Cook County is slightly higher. As Brown noted, the number of people in the Cook County Jail has fallen dramatically since 2014 with no apparent effect on the rate of shootings.
  • Next, fewer people were alleged to have violated the terms of their house arrest this year than last. Between January and May 2020, the State’s Attorney charged only 110 people with “Escape” from electronic monitoring, compared to 237 in the same time period in 2019. There is no reason whatsoever to believe that any significant number of people actively violate electronic monitoring to commit crimes.
  • Further, violent crime has continued to fall throughout 2017, 2018, 2019, and the first half of 2020. The Superintendent cited the Chicago Tribune’s reporting on gun violence, which relied on an unpublished, non-peer reviewed paper authored by two researchers at the University of Utah. There is no study that suggests that violent crime has increased 33% since the beginning of bond reform, as claimed. The negative impacted predicted by the study are simply not born out by reality. Furthermore, Superintendent Brown did not reference the study correctly—even on its own terms. The entirety of the study has been thoroughly debunked by researchers at the JFA in Denver who found only a small increase in the number of people arrested for new crimes while released pretrial—the increase of under 500 people was statistically insignificant in the face of the over 134,000 arrests made in Cook County each year. These researchers also noted that “no credible researcher” would use the estimation methods that the Tribune used to predict rearrest rates.

Violence in Chicago is a complex problem driven by centuries of systemic racism and intentional policies of divestment, exclusion, and austerity. Despite decades of claims from City officials, the Chicago Police Department, and local media outlets that increased police presence and aggressive prosecution and punishment will reduce the violence, evidence has continually shown the opposite: increased use of police and jailing simply does not mitigate violence. We must focus on what is proven to work instead of wasting time returning to tired, disproven talking points that target and punish Black communities.

Superintendent Brown was right about one thing, however: the best way to stop violence is to prevent it from happening in the first place. But while the Chicago Police Department’s budget increases every year, community-based anti-violence groups received only $9-million of the $50-million in city funding requested in 2019. We must shift the focus from criminalization after harm occurs to effective neighborhood-driven, community-based anti-violence programs; trauma and harm-reduction services; and jobs and youth programs. This summer in particular, when communities like Englewood are seeing unemployment rates top 35%, the City of Chicago must be deliberate in providing additional support to Black, Brown, and impoverished communities. 

It is disturbing to see our public officials continue to ignore the facts and cling to the same policies that have failed Chicagoans year after year. The current budget for the Chicago Police Department is over $1.7 billion. In 2018 alone, taxpayers also spent an additional $113-million settling police misconduct lawsuits. There is plenty of money available to help our communities heal. It is time for a new approach to anti-violence work in Chicago, one focused on reinvesting in our communities instead of funding police and jails.

This is a joint statement from the member organizations of the Coalition to End Money Bond. You can find its original publication here.