Since @decarcerateutah’s bail fund is opening today (!!), I’m sharing a lot of info about bail and pre-trial detention. Right now, I’m going to do a thread about my arrest for felony charges of buying paint, my experience in @SLCOMetroJail, and why I won’t shut up about bail. https://twitter.com/decarcerateutah/status/1300833474614456320

I was arrested by SLCPD on August 4, the day after my 28th birthday, two days after CHPD brutalized protestors and maced me in the face. SLCPD waited around the corner from my house for over 4 hours (!!) while my warrant processed. Documented here https://twitter.com/utahmads/status/1290758686789341185?s=21 https://twitter.com/utahmads/status/1290758686789341185

This ^ was less than two weeks after the first documented incident of cops lurking around my house, July 23, which was extremely bizarre and ended with both the city police department and the mayor apologizing to me on twitter (??) https://twitter.com/utahmads/status/1286359676418809856?s=21 https://twitter.com/utahmads/status/1286359676418809856

Timeline —
• July 2: car impounded by SLCPD after a protest
• July 9: beaten by SLCPD at a protest
• July 23: SLCPD cruisers case my house
• August 2: pepper sprayed and car impounded by CHPD
• August 4: SLCPD cruisers case my house (again)
• August 4: arrested/jailed

When I was arrested, I had a lawyer, a bail fund, AND I got a tip that my charges were coming so I had some time to prepare. Not a lot — they arrested me almost as soon as the warrant posted — but enough. Most people don’t have one of those things, much less all three.

Being arrested sucked even with the cops trying to be nice. One was all, “I know there’s a lot of people saying bad stuff about cops, but don’t worry, we’re good guys, we’ll get you to jail safely” first of all I’m the one saying bad stuff about you second of all jail isn’t safe

I’m sharing all of this not to bore you to death but to now draw a mental comparison between me, a white female protestor arrested gently at home on multiple felony charges, and the everyday brutality inflicted upon low-income BIPOC for things like “loitering”

We drive to the jail. The cop has to put my seatbelt on for me because I am handcuffed, which is a lot more intimate than anyone wants to be with a cop. Btw the backseat of this cop car was made of straight-up plastic probably bc they saw all y’alls tweets about peeing in them

We get to the jail, cop tells me my charges again, he has my phone and everything in my pockets now, we walk up to the jail, and I enter a frozen concrete labyrinth that makes me nostalgic for the plastic toilet feel of the cop car

First of all, it’s like, 50 degrees in jail, so that’s the initial thing you feel. While you are absorbing the frigid cold, they take your temperature at the entrance, and that’s pretty much the last time anyone in there will acknowledge that there’s a pandemic.

They handcuffed me to a metal bar, in what could be described as a seat in the sense that it’s a concrete block with metal bars on three sides. It’s all set up like an evil pool locker room. The first thing I hear is a staff member calling an inmate an asshole, so that’s good

Finally go up for the first step of processing. They took my mask, and made me stick my fingers in my mouth so they could check my gums and under my tongue. No hand sanitizer, gloves, hand-washing, just a bunch of people sticking their hands in their mouths raw during a pandemic

Now at this point, they’re taking all my stuff and letting me get three (3) numbers out of my phone. If I didn’t have a phone on me, oh well. It had been at least an hour since I was put in handcuffs at this point with no chance to communicate with anyone (like....for bail)

I am finally allowed the privilege of entering the holding area, referred to as “the pits” by the staff. There are two sunken “pits” in the floor with phones and benches. here’s a pretty old but good rending of the cell-side wall and also a picture I drew of the larger interior

So I sit with my fellow inmates in a literal sunken place, looking up at the staff members and COs, who are all wearing masks (we’re not) and have little construction paper “THANK YOU!” hands taped up behind them, while across the room somebody is detoxing from black tar heroin

At this point it’s been a couple hours since my arrest and I’m finally able to call my friends. They started working on bail right away, but they couldn’t really do anything until I was processed — which again, can take hours. I was lucky they were waiting by the phone for me.

So I’m in the first pit. Make phone calls, sit and wait forever, they call me for step 2 (a bunch of questions — height, nickname, etc), sit back down and wait forever some more, then step 3 (mugshot). Once they get that info, you are FINALLY processed into the system

Once you’re booked, you show up on the inmate search and somebody can pay your bail. My friends were working with a bail bondsman. They are a predatory industry but they’re the only way you can get out without paying at least $1000. I talk about that here https://twitter.com/utahmads/status/1299737061440720897?s=21 https://twitter.com/utahmads/status/1299737061440720897

The guy takes me from mugshot land over to holding #4, where I wait for the fingerprint guy to be ready. His office is the only place I get to wash my hands and he watches me do it the entire time. They take a gazillion prints then send me to holding #2 to call pretrial services

Pretrial services screens every inmate. Their # is taped above one of the phones in holding. They ask a bunch of questions to determine which defendants can be released on their own recognizance (without bail). Sadly I am ordered to stay at the jail https://slco.org/criminal-justice/pretrial-services/

This is where my brain gets a little mushy, but there are a couple different ways forward at this point, including going before a judge. Basically the process is confusing as hell and if you come into jail without a lawyer or anyone to call to get you a lawyer, you are screwed.

I’m in pit #2. I should mention that the jail staff have marked off X’s on the concrete benches with painter’s tape, in the feeblest possible attempt to enforce social distancing. The only inmates with masks are those packed 3:1 into holding cells behind us.

Three-ish hours now. I call my friends. They’re having issues finding a co-signatory, aka the person who says “yes, I will pay this $5000 back to you if she doesn’t show up to court.” Can’t be my dad (out of state), can’t be Isaac (hasn’t lived in Utah long enough)....

You only get 3 phone numbers. Someone has to co-sign your bail bond, and they have to trust you enough to be on the hook for $$$$ if you don’t show up to court. Do you have 3 people in your phone who would do that for you? I did, and the bail bondsman rejected 2 of them.

We land on one of my other roommates as co-signatory, after extensive coordination that was only possible because a group of my friends were working together. If they all worked nights? Didn’t have cell phones? Didn’t have $500 ready, even if they found a co-signatory? I’d be SOL