No Bail, More Jail, The Data Behind Holding Repeat Offenders Before Trial

If the goal of criminal justice is public safety, then the most absurd policy in recent memory is the unsecured-bail and pro-bail movement. It asks law-abiding citizens to absorb the risk of known threats, all while cloaking the decision in language about fairness and compassion. But fairness to whom? Compassion for what? The facts, often inconvenient to ideological crusaders, show that when repeat offenders are released without bail, they offend again, and they do it quickly. Two very public murders in the last 3 years just local evidence of predictable events that occur regularly world-wide.

The public doesn’t need another debate about root causes. It needs protection from known threats. The revolving door of justice has become so greased with sentimentality and theoretical reforms that dangerous individuals are back on the street before the paperwork is filed. We are not speaking of first-time shoplifters or petty loiterers. We are speaking of chronic predators, career offenders with a documented history of theft, violence, rape, intimidation, destruction and murder. These are not unknown quantities, they are repeat customers of the system.

Statistical analysis of crime patterns across major suburban centres in Australia makes the trend plain, a small fraction of individuals account for a disproportionate number of violent and disruptive acts. When these individuals are held pretrial, community harm drops. When they’re released without conditions or consequence, it rises. It doesn’t take a think tank to understand this. A police officer, a security guard, or any small business owner on a main street could have told you the same thing long before the data caught up.

Proponents of pro-bail reform often operate under the fantasy that every accused person is a misunderstood victim of circumstance. But this ignores the psychological profile of many habitual offenders, individuals who are not only indifferent to consequences but emboldened by weakness. When the system signals hesitation or appeasement, these individuals don’t reflect, they reload. They interpret leniency not as mercy, but as societies surrender.

From a security standpoint, the pattern is predictable, fewer conditions, more crime, less supervision, more escalation. In high-risk environments like bus terminals, shopping precincts, and government facilities, it is the repeat offender, frequently on bail conditions, who poses the greatest threat to staff, patrons, and police. And yet, even after violent incidents, activist judicial members often send them back out on nothing more than a promise.

The promise of a repeat offender is worthless. What matters is control, physical, legal, and psychological. That control is exercised by denying access to the environment where the crime occurred. The most effective intervention is not another welfare program or therapy session. It’s a cell. Not forever, not out of vengeance, but out of prudence. Jail isn’t about punishment for these cases, it’s about prevention. Criminals behind bars cannot harm the public.

Every profession that deals with high-risk individuals, from forensic psychology to frontline policing, and the average security guard acknowledges that past behaviour is the best predictor of future actions. And yet, courtrooms, especially in the Northern Territory of Australia, increasingly ignore this hard-earned wisdom. Instead of assessing a threat, they assess an ideology. They are more afraid of headlines about inequality or inequity than headlines about dead civilians.

Behind this crisis is a philosophical failure, the inability to prioritise the innocent over the dangerous. The right to freedom must never be weaponised against the right to life. Holding a repeat violent offender in custody is not an injustice, it is a moral necessity. The burden should not fall on shopkeepers, commuters, schoolchildren, or security personnel to absorb the risks of ideological daydreams.

The irony, of course, is that bail reform has backfired. Where pro-bail policies have been implemented, recidivism has surged, public trust has eroded, and communities have grown more segregated, those with means flee or fortify, while those without must simply endure. The data is clear, its been clear since the 1960s and hasn’t changed, in jurisdictions where repeat offenders are denied bail, violent crime drops significantly. In areas where bail is treated as a bureaucratic inconvenience, the predators flourish and the victims multiply.

Let us be clear, pretrial detention is not about guilt or innocence. It is about probability, prevention, and public protection. Risk-based assessment, not ideological slogans, should determine custody. If someone has assaulted three people while on bail for a fourth assault, the answer is not more empathy. The answer is a locked door.

There is a time for reform. But there is also a time for restraint. Justice without order is just sentiment in a robe. If we want fewer crimes, we must accept more cells. Not for everyone. But for the few who have shown us, time and again, exactly who they are. Personally, it has become abundantly clear some of those cells need to hold some criminal judicial members as well. From the author.

The opinions and statements are those of Sam Wilks and do not necessarily represent whom Sam Consults or contracts to. Sam Wilks is a skilled and experienced Security and Risk Consultant with 3 decades of expertise in the fields of Real estate, Security, and the hospitality/gaming industry. Sam has trained over 1,000 entry level security personnel, taught defensive tactics, weapons training and handcuffs to policing personnel and the public. His knowledge and practical experience have made him a valuable asset to many organisations looking to enhance their security measures and provide a safe and secure environment for their clients and staff.