Recently, Illinois celebrated the one-year anniversary of the Pretrial Fairness Act. Now, public safety, not money, determines whether someone is in jail while their case is pending. Opponents of the Act, including Connecticut bail bondsmen watching from afar, claimed it would be a public safety disaster. They declared that crime would increase and Illinois would turn into a revolving door for career criminals, full of Gotham-like cities. One year later, we have evidence of how false those claims were. The new system in Illinois is working. Crime is down, as are jail populations. People are showing up to court for their hearings, and there has been no increase in reoffending for those on pretrial release. As we approach the next Connecticut legislative session, we should learn from the Illinois experience and stop listening to those who fearmonger to maintain the status quo – namely the bail bond industry. Anytime someone pushes for change in Connecticut, the bail bond industry, which profits only because of the persistence of cash bail, makes claims about its importance — claims that the data inevitably will (or already) debunks.  It is time to end giving their claims any credence. Earlier this year, for example, the former vice president of the state’s bail bond industry testified that crime rates in cities that have ended or reduced their reliance on money bail are through the roof. The opposite is true. Following the end of money bail in Illinois, crime dropped or stayed the same across the state. That should be no surprise to those following the evidence of bail reform across the country, where reform efforts showed no increase in crime.  A recent report from the Brennan Center, for example, compared crime over six years in cities with money bail reform to cities that utilized it. The study found no statistically significant relationship between bail reform and crime rates. One of the industry’s most frequently employed arguments against change is that bondsmen are necessary to return people to court. In opposing pretrial reform last year, several wrote that “[b]ond agents actively track and locate defendants with court date reminders and check-ins as well as apprehending those who attempt to evade the legal process.” Similarly, the past vice president of the state bail bond industry testified that “[w]e return fugitives [to court] to give victims the ability to be heard, feel safe and get their ‘day in court.'” In an article in the Connecticut Mirror, he similarly wrote that without bail bond agents “the risk of individuals skipping court dates and evading justice significantly increases.” But there is no evidence that bail bond agents actually improve or ensure people’s court appearance. In study after study, researchers have found that court appearances in places reducing their reliance on money bail do not decline. In some places, the elimination of bail actually improved rates of appearanc. Illinois did not ever use bond agents, but they did use money bail.  Since its end, failures to appear in court have not decreased, and they are not higher than in places that utilize bond agents across the country. Tellingly, failures to appear in court have not increased in Connecticut after the state changed its rules and allowed people to pay 10% of their bail directly to the court instead of to a bondsman, a change the industry opposed. People are not fleeing to other jurisdictions, chuckling that they have no assigned bounty hunter and can escape. They are following the rules and coming to court, but are receiving that money back upon resolution of their case. Of course,  there is no evidence that Connecticut’s bail bondsmen, or any bondsmen in the country for that matter, are actually bringing people back to court with any regularity. Connecticut does not track that important data point. Bail bond agents just ask us to take their word for it. It is time for legislators in Connecticut to learn from the actual data here and in other states rather than to the unfounded claims made by industry members who depend on money bail to exist. Of course they resort to fearmongering every time legislators push for change – without money bail, bondsmen have no place in our criminal legal system. The experience in Illinois, like in New Jersey and in other places that have reduced its reliance on money bail, suggests that is how it should be. We can be safer and more equitable without money bail and the agents who profit from it. We cannot wait another session to start fixing this system. Connecticut should be a leader in evidence-based change, not a follower of fact-less claims about safety. We hope our leaders learn from Illinois and other states, and end a practice that harms our communities and simply lines the pockets of a few. Alexander Taubes is a civil rights attorney in New Haven.