“At a time where gun violence continues to plague our communities and bail reform is at the forefront of our minds, such innovative programmatic concepts are inspiring. We thought the program required more development from a legal standpoint.” – Baltimore State’s Attorney spokesman Melba Saunders in Guns for bail? Baltimore City Council considers it [via baltimoresun.com]

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43 COMMENTS

  1. Barter is a thing.

    Question is, will the bailee get the gun back or is it gone for good?

    • When I saw the title of this article, I thought it doesn’t get more absurd that. I was wrong.

  6. Dang, some of us could do just about anything in Baltimore then, and still post bail.

  7. “No one wants to take your guns”
    Followed by example after another of tyrannical programs designed to do just that.
    I gave up support for the “War on drugs” when I realized it was just a masked operation to collect firearms.

    • The idea of accepting guns instead of cash for bail isn’t tyrannical, it’s just really, really stupid.

    • well, not JUST to collect firearms. There’s the desensitization to no-knock raids, militarized police, abject violation of fourth amendment rights, criminalization of otherwise non criminal acts, etc. NEVER, has it had anything whatsoever to do with stopping drugs. It has always been about empowering government.

        • Bill Hicks nailed it when he said “Its not a war on drugs. It’s a war on personal freedom. It’s what it is OK? Keep that in mind at all times. Thank you.”

  8. Doesn’t this sort of make guns even more valuable to a criminal? I’m sure it will get more guns off the street but it will also increase criminal demand for them. So, at best, it’s a wash?

  9. Brooks thinks the daily carnage on the mean streets of Baltimore as “random act(s) of violence”? Hogwash! There’s nothing “random” about it. The great majority of the homicides are drug dealers killing off their competition. It’s people with violent felony convictions being killed by other violent felons. Neither the shooter or his “victim” can legally carry a firearm – but they do.

  11. Bail is supposed to be to so you will show up at trial. You should get it back the second you walk through the door. But the courts seem to always try to pull a fast one if bail is privately funded. You should always use a bail bondsman they are much more likely to get the money back.

    • I actually heard a couple of ex-cons laughing about that once. To them, bail was a way of paying fines they’d never gotten around to managing to pay, because before you get back any bail money they check to see if you owe the court any money for ANYTHING — apparently even parking tickets are fair game now.

      I used to post bail for people I was working to help straighten out their lives, but no longer because the court will find some reason to never give it back. And a defense attorney I’ve worked with helping people says bail less than $10k no longer means anything because the courts have come up with so many fees and fines that almost no one gets their money back anyway.

  12. very flexible of them, violent criminals are covered.

    what’s a working girl allowed to post?

  13. So if all i have is a gun to bail someone out with, guess what. Your ass is staying in jail!

  16. This is just mind bogglingly stupid. The possible situations for this are limited.

    1) Someone is a legal gun owner and gets arrested for something. Lets say a DUI. They have bartered their gun for bail. There’s not really anything wrong with this, but much like the buy backs, it’s not targeting guns likely to be used in crime, which is put forth as a benefit of doing this.

    2) The person is not a legal gun owner and doesn’t have a gun. But also can’t make bail. You now encourage the relatives of this person to steal firearms. Taking stolen firearms as bail either means you are forfeiting any possibilty of charging them for this crime, because it would be entrapment, or you are deliberately ignoring the origin of the item and thus ignoring evidence. So your solution to crime is incentivize more crime.

    3) The person is not a legal gun owner and does have guns to trade. These guns are likely involved in crimes. This is either entrapment, or you are forfeiting ever prosecuting those crimes. Thus giving incentive to get locked up for something lightweight like drunk and disorderly to poison evidence to more serious crimes. At best you get a “comunity gun” off the street. You also possibly incite retaliation for turning in the community gun. So you incentivize crime AND possibly incite retaliation amongst the criminals of the community.

    Wow… just.. wtf are they thinking.

    • I am 100% certain that politicians in charge of failed systems race from one headliner to the next in hopes that the press don’t bother the highlight the failures and who is in charge of them. as long as they get a rung up the ladder, they dont care.

      also fixing it would upset all the criminals, from elected to street level. so that is a no go.

  17. Obviously, the collective IQ of Baltimore is between 6 and 6.1, which is only slightly above that of a garden snail although Baltimore is a lot more slimy.

  18. Guns are fungible goods, just like everything else. I see no reason why you couldn’t use them as collateral the same way you would use other property. Of course, guns would be one of the last things I would resort to for bail.

    If they accepted car titles for bail, would that encourage stealing cars?

    I have no problem with the use of guns for bail. However, I have LOTS issues with the people who proposed it.

  19. I see a new business opportunity here: a couple of guys living on the edge of the law could just set up shop manufacturing cheap guns for the sole purpose of selling them to people who need to make bail. They can’t get caught, because the police aren’t allowed to use the guns as evidence of anything.

  20. Taking this at face value, bail is generally 10% cash price of the set number. The value most guns is rather lower than that. Do they expect a crook putting up a used Hi point to show for trial?

  21. lol sure. Great idea, totally in line with the Baltimore State’s Attorney’s office and Mosby

    PROTIP: Make sure to give them a gun you or your buddy murdered someone with, that way it can’t be used as evidence. Safer than throwing it in the garbage!

    • Heck, someone could make a small business of buying guns from criminals to sell to other criminals to use for bail!

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