Indiana Lawmakers Crack Down on Bail Charities After Grisly Murders
Bill would block bail funds from paying bond for accused felons
Indiana lawmakers are working to crack down on bail charities after one such nonprofit sprung two defendants from jail who were subsequently charged with grisly murders.
Republican legislators have crafted a bill to regulate bail funds after local press reported that a national nonprofit called The Bail Project bonded out two accused offenders subsequently charged with homicides in Indianapolis. An Indiana state Senate committee on Tuesday heard testimony about the bill from Nikki Sterling, the mother of one of the people allegedly murdered by a Bail Project client.
"In principle, aiding an individual who stole food to feed their family is admirable," Sterling told the committee on Tuesday. "However, The Bail Project is bailing out offenders with violent criminal histories. And sadly, it's the very communities they claim to be advocating for that are now in harm's way by having these dangerous individuals back out on the street."
The Bail Project's Indianapolis clients who prompted the new legislation are Travis Lang and Marcus Garvin. Lang has been charged with the Oct. 1 shooting death of 24-year-old Dylan McGinnis, Sterling's son. The Bail Project and a for-profit bail bondsman helped Lang post a $5,650 bond for a drug charge, despite prior felony prosecutions for burglary and resisting law enforcement.
Garvin is accused of murdering his girlfriend, 30-year-old Christie Lynn Holt. Garvin allegedly stabbed Holt 51 times because he suspected her of cheating on him, then attempted to dismember her body before disposing of it near a creek.
Garvin was out on a $1,500 bond with an ankle monitor at the time of Holt's murder. He was arrested in December 2020 for stabbing a customer at a gas station where he worked the checkout counter. Garvin allegedly followed the customer out of the station's convenience store, stabbed him in the back, and resumed checking out customers until authorities arrived, according to the Indianapolis Star.
Indianapolis is one of many American cities struggling against a surge of violent crime. It’s a crisis of many causes. Some cities have poured huge sums into diversionary programs at the expense of law enforcement, while police grapple with the same staffing shortages plaguing the private sector. And many jurisdictions curtailed pretrial detention in the name of COVID mitigation, a boon for repeat offenders. Indianapolis set a record for murders in 2021, and more than 700 people were wounded in shootouts.
State senator Aaron Freeman (R.), the Indiana bill's author and lead sponsor, told the Washington Free Beacon that ending the crime wave is an economic as well as public safety imperative.
"We pride ourselves on being a welcoming place," Freeman said. "We've got to get our arms around this. If we don't, my fear is it's going to hurt the economic engine of this state."
The bill is one of the first legislative efforts in the nation to regulate bail charities. Donations to such organizations soared during the 2020 Floyd riots, fueled by Democratic politicians keen on helping demonstrators. But community bail funds vary in professionalism and operational capacity. Some have drawn scrutiny from charity watchdogs with their spotty reporting practices and cash-hoarding tendencies.
The Indiana bill would prevent funds from bailing out accused felons or defendants with means, limiting aid to "two thousand dollars or less for an indigent person charged with a misdemeanor." And if bail fund clients miss court appearances, their bond payments will be reassigned to the state's general fund, putting bail charities on the hook when their clients don't comply with their release terms.
That latter provision will force charitable bail funds to tighten up their operations. Many community bail funds are supported by volunteers led by a cadre of paid staff. They don’t have the capacity to track client cases, ensure they obey their release terms, or hunt fugitives like a bail bondsman does. As such, they'll have to develop compliance practices and become more selective at posting bail, or face the consequences. Sterling highlighted that point during her testimony on Tuesday.
"The Bail Project operates without regulation, meaning that they can bail out whomever they want, regardless of the charge," Sterling said. "Furthermore, once out on bond, the offender is not accountable to the charitable bail organization, and the organization does not have any oversight of the offender once released."
Losing bail payments could undermine a bail fund's financial stability over time. Though many bail funds have multiple revenue streams, they usually count on bail payments they post coming back to the organization once a client's case has been resolved. Every bail payment lost can undercut their ability to help a future client.
The bill also forbids local and state governments from funding bail charities. It further requires bail funds to obtain certification from the state insurance commissioner, which must be renewed every two years. The commissioner can decertify an organization if its staff misuses funds or engages in "fraud, dishonesty, or deception."
The Bail Project collected approximately $250,000 in taxpayer dollars via an Indianapolis-funded crime prevention program administered by the Central Indiana Community Foundation.
David Gaspar, The Bail Project's national operations director, defended his organization to the committee on Tuesday and accused others of exploiting the McGinnis and Holt murders to advance an anti-reform agenda.
"The manner in which they have been politicized shows a double standard and a political agenda that must be acknowledged," he said. "What The Bail Project would like to talk to lawmakers about is how to reform the bail system so due process is not tied to how much money a person has."
The Bail Project has assisted nearly 1,000 low-income residents in the Indianapolis area since 2018, according to Gaspar.
Freeman, the bill's sponsor, said on balance the bill simply regulates bail charities in the same manner as for-profit bail bondsmen.
"In Indiana, our Department of Insurance regulates bail bondsmen, and that’s what [bail charities] are doing," he told the Free Beacon. "Everyone should play by the same set of rules."
15 Shot Monday Thru Tuesday in Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s Chicago
Fifteen people were shot, two of them fatally, Monday through Tuesday in Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s (D) Chicago.
NBC Chicago reports that seven people were shot and wounded on Monday and FOX 32 / Chicago Sun-Times notes that eight people were shot Tuesday.
Two of Tuesday’s shooting victims succumbed to their wounds. Both deaths occurred shortly after 7 a.m. in a residence “in the 4900 block of South Marshfield Avenue.” Police were called to the residence and arrived to find three people had been shot, and two of them were dead at the scene.
Monday and Tuesday’s violence follows a weekend during which 21 people were shot in Lightfoot’s Chicago, five of them fatally.
The Sun-Times points out that 81 people have been murdered in Chicago thus far in 2022.
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio and a Turning Point USA Ambassador. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. Reach him at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange
GHETTO BLACK AMERICA
IS IT THE MOST VIOLENT SUBCULTURE
IN THE WORLD?
Mother accused of forcing child to put hands in oven, striking him with bat
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_PZR_2Eb-mI
BLACK Catholic priest sentenced to 94.5 months in prison in Miami-Dade
Homestead Catholic priest sentenced to nearly 8 years in prison
Man Punches 4-Year-Old in Head in Times Square, Mother Helps Detain Suspect, Authorities Say
A man who has a track record of assaulting strangers allegedly punched a four-year-old boy in the head in Times Square on Thursday, authorities say.
Police say the attack occurred around 3:20 p.m. at the corner of 7th Avenue and West 46th Street when Babacar Mbaye, 34, randomly pummelled the small child who was with his 43-year-old mother, WABC reports.
Surveillance footage obtained by the New York Post shows two women, one of whom is the four-year-old’s mother, going after the suspect. One of the women tackled the perp to the ground while the other swung an object in her hand while standing over him, the footage appears to show. Two police officers then burst into the frame, with one of them engaging the suspect on the ground as the woman who was battling the man gets up, the video allegedly shows. It is unclear which woman is the boy’s mother, the Post reports.
“Who needs DA Bragg? The mother took care of justice the old fashioned way,” a Manhattan officer told the outlet, taking an apparent swipe at Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
The boy received medical attention at the scene in Times Square.
While being taken into custody, Mbaye allegedly kicked a police officer.
Prosecutors said that once he was in custody at Bellevue Hospital, he allegedly told police that he “drank a whole bottle of hand sanitizer” and added, “I shouldn’t have done this,” the Post reports.
He was charged with felony assault, reckless endangerment, and resisting arrest, prosecutors and police said. He was arraigned on Friday.
A New York City Police Department (NYPD) spokesman told WNBC that Mbaye has 40 prior arrests. His record, which dates back to 2009, includes arrests for criminal possession of a weapon, assault, driving while intoxicated, and menacing, sources told the Post. Additionally, he has 16 misdemeanor convictions on his record, prosecutors said.
At the time of Thursday’s attack, he was on supervised release for three open misdemeanors related to “assaulting strangers,” which date back to last summer, prosecutors said, per the Post. Two of the attacks happened in the past month; one where he “pushed a stranger and punched her twice in the shoulder,” and another in which he “punched a stranger in the head,” prosecutors said.
Manhattan Criminal Court Judge Jay Weiner set Mbaye’s bail at $30,000 cash, and Bragg’s office asked for bail be upped to $50,000, the Post reports.
Thomas Kenniff, Mbaye’s lawyer, said the defendant lives with his mother and siblings and is unemployed.
Per the Post, Kenniff said:
He was dancing in the midst of Times Square and inadvertently made contact with the child … which drew the ire of the child’s mother who maybe perhaps reasonably believed that he intended to strike the child. But I’m confident that was not his intention.
Mbaye is due back in court on Wednesday.
No comments:
Post a Comment