Examining the Effects of New York’s Bail Law on Pretrial Recidivism: A Controlled-Interrupted Time Series Analysis

In January 2020, New York implemented a bail reform law restricting judges’ discretion to set money bail for certain offense types. We used a controlled-interrupted time series (CITS) design to estimate the reform’s impact on pretrial recidivism. Leveraging the reform’s offense-based eligibility criteria, defendants were separated into treatment and control groups. By comparing recidivism pre- and post-reform and between the treatment and control groups, we were able to minimize confounding from coinciding changes. We evaluated the new law’s effect on multiple recidivism measures: any re-arrest, felony re-arrest, and violent felony re-arrest. In addition, we conducted subgroup analyses for high-risk defendants with recent criminal history. We found a statistically significant increase in violent felony re-arrests among the subgroup of individuals with recent criminal history.