With the ACLU’s Criminal Law Reform Project, we filed an amicus brief in support of the plaintiffs in Medina v. Hon. Allen in the Tenth Circuit on September 19, 2023. We argued that Plaintiffs sufficiently pled several constitutional violations in district court as a result of being held subject to bail that they could not afford to pay.
In district court, plaintiffs challenged Utah’s requirements that people who have been arrested must post an upfront sum of money bail or remain incarcerated. Bail is set by a judicial officer behind closed doors, without notice or any opportunity for the arrestee to participate in the proceedings. Our central argument was that the plaintiffs’ claims triggered a more rigorous standard of review under that Fourteenth Amendment than the district court applied in granting a motion to dismiss the case.
