Bail Facts

Secured bail is not effective because defendants enjoy paying a premium. It is effective because a surety has money, authority, information, and reputation at risk if the defendant disappears.

Minnesota's own validation study found that the original statewide MNPAT was only "kind of" predictive overall and negligibly predictive for Black and Native American defendants. The revised tool improved performance, but it remains a prediction instrument - not an accountability system.

How the same court data can be spun into a success story or a warning, depending entirely on how you count

Under secured bail, the private surety carries the cost and the risk of getting a defendant back to court. Not the taxpayer. Eliminate it, and those functions don’t vanish. They land in a government-run system paid for with state and county tax dollars.

Minnesota’s bail professionals have launched a new statewide nonprofit, the Minnesota Bail Association (MBA), to defend secured bail and to give the profession one credible voice with lawmakers, the courts, and the public.