Some poor people who are arrested in Dallas County must now wait in jail for about a week longer before release than they would have in the past, officials said Friday. The delay for inmates who can't afford to post bond is due to both clerical and legal changes in recent years in the way cases move through the court system. Thousands of defendants have been affected, leading to social costs — such as job loss — for arrestees and financial costs for the county, which spends $72 per day on each inmate. "I'm on panic mode," Commissioner John Wiley Price said at a Jail Population Committee meeting. "They keep saying we're running a debtors' prison. Poor folks can't get out." Continue reading...
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