MN Freedom Fund to stop paying bail for criminal suspects
Lawmaker questions, attorney defends Minnesota Freedom Fund's cash bail practices after FOX 9 investigation
When two Minneapolis Police officers charged with aiding and abetting the murder of George Floyd bailed out jail, few people raised an eyebrow. Hennepin County’s Chief Public Defender, Mary Moriarty, believes that is telling.
MINNEAPOLIS (FOX 9) - The Minnesota Freedom Fund, the nonprofit that bailed out protesters in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd, says it will stop its controversial practice of bailing out criminal suspects.
Minnesota Freedom Fund won't bail out suspects
What we know:
The Minnesota Freedom Fund announced the decision to shift away from paying pre-trial bail in an email sent out to supporters on Wednesday.
In the email, officials say the change will be at first implemented on a temporary basis, and they will evaluate it after a year.
The shift in policy takes effect on June 1, 2025.
What they're saying:
Organizers with the fund say they will instead shift their focus to implementing "systematic change."
Executive Director Elizer Darris wrote in an email to FOX 9: "Philosophically, we have come to a hard truth: We cannot bail and bond our way out of the harmful systems of pretrial detention and immigration detention. Our work has supported thousands of individuals and their families during the last nine years, and it has also made clear that by channeling our resources directly into these systems, we risk inadvertently sustaining and legitimizing systems and actors we know to be fundamentally unjust."
Darris says the decision was also made out of fiscal necessity, saying, "Our goal is not to sustain our organization indefinitely. It is to put ourselves out of business once and for all by ending the systems we were created to address."
Controversy over policy
The backstory:
The fund raised $42 million during the 2020 riots after getting promotion from celebrities and politicians, who urged supporters to help protesters arrested in Minneapolis.
It was a massive windfall for the small nonprofit and left some wondering what the organization would do with the cash.
In the following months, the nonprofit faced scrutiny over some of the suspects it had bailed out. In one case, the fund bailed out a man named George Howard who was arrested on a domestic violence charge in August 2021.
Weeks later, he was arrested in a deadly shooting along I-94. He was later convicted of the shooting and is currently surviving time in the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Faribault.
A FOX 9 investigation found that Freedom Fund had bailed out people accused of crimes including murder, rape, and gun offenses.
Local perspective:
Hennepin County's Chief Public Defender, Mike Berger, responded to the fund's decision in a statement to FOX 9 on Wednesday.
He writes: "This was – no doubt – a difficult decision for MFF and their many dedicated staff members. This will have a negative effect on many of our clients, however, Mr. Darris’s statements ring true to our office and our clients. Simply paying bail for indigent individuals is only a Band-Aid on a deeply flawed system of pre-trial release. Our office will push forward – every day – to argue for our clients release; to argue the disparities imposed on those incarcerated pre-trial; and argue against a deeply flawed two-tier bail system in Minnesota."