One of the most common conditions of pretrial release authorized under MCR 6.106 is that a person may be ordered to "(a) make reports to a court agency as are specified by the court or the agency; (b) not use alcohol or illicitly use any controlled substance; (c) participate in a substance abuse testing or monitoring program . . . ." This means reporting to probation as well as alcohol testing, even though you are presumed innocent and have not been found guilty.
This is the newest craze amongst Michigan judges, who will order this condition to "protect the public" because you drive at a risk on the public roads. (This presumes you drive around drunk all the time, even though you have no prior convictions.) Maybe you do stand an increased risk to the public because you are going through a divorce, someone died, or you are suffering from some other stressful or tragic event. Alcohol monitoring should be ordered in appropriate cases, but this condition should be the exception and not the rule.
These conditions cannot be ordered unless the "court determines that the release [under personal recognizance] will not reasonably ensure the appearance of the defendant as required, or will not reasonably ensure the safety of the public . . . ." This means that you must have a high BAC or prior offenses before this condition is deemed reasonable.
Aggressive judges, who seek to monitor your every move and every sip of alcohol, can use this rule punitively to impose harsh conditions, and you get to pay for the privilege while purportedly free on bond. JAMs, which stands for Jail Alternatives of Michigan LLC, was one of the original alcohol monitoring agencies that sprung up into existence when alcohol monitoring became fashionable.
Conditional bonds are favorable to monetary bonds, since poor people might spend months in jail awaiting trial. If a bad person is doing bad things, it is a good thing for a local judge to intervene and order the bad guy to stop doing bad things. But these new alcohol monitoring programs are outrageous. Judges now routinely order a person to participate in JAMs testing when there is virtually no risk to the public, and this company is profiting to the tune of millions of dollars.
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