For several days, former President Donald Trump and his 18 co-defendants in a Georgia election interference case trickled into the Fulton County Jail in Atlanta to surrender for arrest, fingerprinting and mugshots before the noon Aug. 25, 2023, deadline. Charged in the same alleged conspiracy to overturn results in Georgia’s 2020 presidential election, the defendants did not draw the same bail agreements or amounts.

Trump’s bail was set at US$200,000, while his former attorney Rudy Giuliani’s bail was set at $150,000. Meanwhile, attorneys John Eastman, Kenneth Chesebro, Jenna Ellis and Sidney Powell each had bail set at $100,000. Bail for other co-defendants ranged from $10,000 to $75,000.

The Conversation asked Megan T. Stevenson, a University of Virginia law professor who researches bail, to answer questions about the American bail system and how the bail amounts in the Georgia election interference case reflect that system.

Citation
Megan T. Stevenson, Trump out on bail – a criminal justice expert explains the system of cash bail, The Conversation (August 25, 2023).