Statistical Results of the Bail Process in Eight Federal District Courts

To obtain empirical data on the Federal bail system, criminal defendant case files in eight Federal judicial districts were randomly sampled. The districts sampled were selected because they represent a cross-section of the Federal bail system in terms of geography, criminal caseload size, and pretrial services agency (PSA) versus non-PSA districts. The data were collected to obtain: an overall statistical view of each district's caseload; detention, failure to appear, and new crime rates; and other statistics which would indicate the overall effectiveness of each district's bail practices.