Коалиция за справедливость в Коннектикуте высадит 3500 флагов в знак протеста против системы денежного залога

A new coalition took its first public action Thursday, planting 3,500 flags in the ground outside the state Capitol — one for each of the approximately 3,500 people incarcerated in Connecticut prisons each day who have not been convicted of a crime. The number represents about a third of the Connecticut prison population and individually represents mothers, fathers, brothers, sons who have been accused but not found guilty. Connecticut Coalition for Pretrial Justice formed to press for reform of the cash bail system in Connecticut, something the group said keeps people behind bars not based on safety concerns but on their ability to pay. “It’s about organizing the people of this state to demand an end to this two-tiered system of justice, where if you’re rich you can buy your freedom, and if you’re poor you’re punished while you’re supposed to be presumed innocent,” the Rev. Scott Marks of New Haven Rising said. It’s an issue that disproportionately affects people of color but also one that coalition members say has disproportionate repercussions for the poor. Marks said the poor, women and people of color are paying the cost of cash bail with more than money. “A missed shift. … if you miss that shift, you might lose your job and not only the person who’s supposed to show up for work. But if they’ve got a mother who’s got two kids waiting to be dressed to go to school, the other person who’s got to go late to work to try to provide — it is a travesty. Lost a place to live. Children taken into state care because the parents are sitting in jail unconvicted. … Too many folks are being punished not for what they did but for what they don’t have,” Marks said. Claudine Constant, director of the Beyond Jails Initiative at Vera Institute of Justice, said even one day can be devastating. “Spending even one day in jail can permanently alter the trajectory of a person’s life, including the collateral consequences of, as Rev. Marks said, job loss or losing custody of their children,” Constant said. Judicial Branch Court Support Services Division data shows that the length of pretrial incarceration can range from 1 to 160 days but the median stay for those charged only with misdemeanor offenses at the time of DOC admission rose from 20 days in 2018 to 28 days in 2023. A report from the Pretrial Working Group notes that while a large proportion of those incarcerated pretrial are classified as charged with only misdemeanor offenses, the data may mischaracterize that group as additional charges are often filed after DOC admission. Marks said the absence of those incarcerated pretrial is harming families and communities. “We know who pays the price. We know in whose neighborhoods these flags would be planted if we placed one at every doorstep of more than 15,000 people who were booked into Connecticut’s prison system pretrial last year,” he said. “You know, I know, we know Black and brown communities in Connecticut are policed more, charged more and detained more.” Constant said failure to appear charges, often due to the bus being late, a lack of childcare or permission to take the day off from work, are driving Connecticut’s pretrial population. “The number of people detained on failure to appear charges has doubled since 2019. Half of the people booked on failure to appear as the top charge, the leading charge, have spent more than a month in jail in pretrial detention,” Constant said, referencing DOC data. “Three in five women booked between 2024 and 2025 had had the most serious charge that was either a misdemeanor, a probation violation or a failure to appear. Studies have shown that almost 80% of women in jails are mothers and most often single mothers,” she said. “When mothers are incarcerated, their children suffer the consequences.” Sen. Gary Winfield, a New Haven Democrat, said the cash bail system is not justice. “No one belongs in jail because they can’t pay. No one belongs in jail because they were a little bit late. No one belongs in jail who is not convicted. I don’t have a lot to say today because this is simple.” The coalition has been canvassing the state, visiting churches, grocery stores and neighborhoods to talk to residents about the issue and gathering 3,500 signatures to present to lawmakers in hopes of inspiring legislative change. The group notes other states, such as Illinois, New Jersey and New York have either reformed or ended cash bail. “The question is never is the person dangerous, it is does the person have money? … We are filling out jails with the consequences of poverty – people who just don’t have enough, calling it public safety,” Marks said.