This post provides a disgruntling update to the judicial accountability bill mentioned in my previous post, titled House Bill 271 Could Tell Us Which Judges Make the Naughty List and Which Make the Nice List. [1] House Bill 271 unfortunately died early in the process, but it was originally intended […]
Criminal Justice Reform
9 posts
By: Jillianne Trotter Maryland could take a small but significant step towards systemic justice this legislative season by passing HB 271, which would require county clerks to record onto Case Search the name of the judge or magistrate who presides over a case. [1] Adopting a uniform process will aid […]
Criminal legal reform is at the top of the list for the Biden administration. This comes as no surprise as part of Biden’s presidential campaign platform promised reducing the United States’ unreasonable reliance on incarceration, correctional supervision, and fines and fees associated with the criminal justice system. It is also […]
On January 17th, the Legal Data and Design Clinic (LDDC) had the pleasure of welcoming Joe Spielberger, an attorney with the ACLU of Maryland and author of the recently published report Chasing Justice: Addressing Police Violence and Corruption in Maryland, to the weekly seminar. Mr. Spielberger and the LDDC engaged […]
Across our nation, courts have jailed increasing numbers of people, mostly black who are awaiting trial. In layman’s terms, courts are putting innocent people in jail for months or years just because they can’t afford to pay their bail. Bail reform legislation has been introduced in Maryland every year since […]
In our last in-person class before going entirely online due to COVID-19, the LDDC welcomed Matthew Stubenberg to our seminar on March 11, 2020. Matthew demonstrated his CLUE system and opened our eyes to ways data scraping can help improve criminal justice. Now the Associate Director of Legal Technology at […]
On July 1, 2017, a new law went into effect in the state of Maryland. It sought to curb the number of defendants being held in Maryland jails for an inability to pay bail. Now, two and half years later, how much has bail reform helped the underprivileged and poor […]
Student attorneys successfully represented the LDDC this week in testimony before the House Judiciary Committee in Annapolis. The Committee heard testimony on House Bill 280, which would disallow the suspension of driver’s licenses for merely failing to pay traffic-related fines and fees. Nearly a dozen testifying witnesses in support of […]
This year, Baltimore will become the first city in the country to openly subject its citizens to continuous aerial video surveillance. The LDDC encourages folks to come out to our University of Baltimore Law School at 7:00 pm on February 25th to participate in a discussion with attorney Ivan Bates […]