Robin Steinberg comments on new report by Human Rights Watch
A new report by the Human Rights Watch finds that thousands of people accused of minor crimes end up in Rikers Island each year only because they cannot afford to pay even small amounts of bail. Read what The Bronx Defenders’ Executive Director, Robin Steinberg, has to say…
“The client is placed with a choice of staying out of jail and being on Rikers Island and fighting their case,” said Robin Steinberg, the director of the Bronx Defenders, a nonprofit group that provides legal representation to Bronx residents charged with crimes.
“Almost anybody would plead guilty. It creates a pressure on poor people in the criminal justice system for them to plead guilty without regard to whether they were guilty or not guilty.”