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Saturday, May 16, 2009
Ind. Courts - Emergency "bonding-out rule" signed Thursday by the judges of St. Joseph Superior Court
Pablo Rios reports today in the South Bend Tribune:
Before a new emergency rule was signed Thursday in St. Joseph Superior Court, an individual arrested a second time could bond out from jail by posting bond according to a presumptive bond schedule established by the courts.Under the new rule, individuals arrested for the second time on a misdemeanor count can no longer bond out. Those individuals must remain in jail until a hearing before a judge. The judge will review the case and set a new bond, which may be higher than the presumptive bond. * * *
The new rule wasn't announced until Friday afternoon, after political activist Alan Keyes and 20 others were arrested for trespassing at the University of Notre Dame.
The new rule is something "we, or at least I, have been thinking about for quite some time," Chief Judge Michael P. Scopelitis said Friday. The arrests of protesters at Notre Dame brought the need for such a rule into focus, but the need existed also in other cases, he said.
A classic example, Scopelitis said, is of an individual arrested for driving while intoxicated, posting bond, then being arrested a second time for driving while intoxicated and posting the presumptive bond yet again.
The new rule would ensure that such a person remains in jail until a judge has a chance to review the case and set an appropriate bond.
The rule became effective Thursday and will remain in effect until Dec. 31, unless it is adopted as a local, permanent rule.
Notre Dame officials did not ask the judges to implement such a rule at this time, Scopelitis said. "This local rule is not for Notre Dame's benefit," he said. "It was not created to benefit Notre Dame in some way."
Posted by Marcia Oddi on May 16, 2009 09:30 AM
Posted to Indiana Courts