deprived of here they're being deprived of their property interest in their money without having due process to hear a full right to a hearing if they can they choose to waive it when they go to the money and go along with the there's both been really don't there's no hearing to wait for lesser referring to a criminal trial yeah what happens if they don't take the deal here they don't take the deal then they power to adjudicate them or for that matter before a police officer instead of a judge so there are some limits to what kinds of things are wave of all in terms of due process and this isn't precisely one of those things if somebody officer and a prosecutor is that the prosecution's office how's additional safeguards to guide that discretion for example if somebody believes that that discretion is completely unfettered decision making on their part but i think another even there or there  and sort of arbitrarily set dollar values for it and then the police officers are given no guidance as to when to offer it and when not but i think when given that he wanted it when the vast majority of arrestees be thrilled to have this option and your suit if successful would take away something that allows quick speedy efficient resolution of of of  well i think it's not really a question of whether people would prefer a system that's that if there's constitutional problems with it it doesn't matter if both sides are happy with it the issue is i think it would be even want a hearing or you can fill out a form and say i did it but least then there would be some opportunity within that system that you know whether or not the council had to create it there would at least be some opportunity to different here is if you if the government wants to offer two tracks both of them need to comport with due process it's not enough to say on the one track the government couldn't offer something with no procedural safeguards because you can always not choose it that would allow the government to create any sort of process regardless of how arbitrary it is as long as the court said as long as the government said well you can always have a criminal trial if you want one that would allow essentially the government to impose whatever conditions they want  and forth that or not but what is unique about here and what never occurs in the criminal process is you never get to say prosecutor i'll give you fifty bucks if you make it a misdemeanor instead of a felony i'll give you one hundred dollars if you just drop the i think that's actually work really i think that's actually part of the problem is it's so lenient that it has a coercive of fact there's no reason for anybody to average choose the criminal process and that is what makes the unconstitutional conditions  good morning may it please the court i'm chasing better sign for the district of columbia we just want to emphasize that this is a legit piece of legislation that the council has adopted to try to meet its demands for an urban municipality  in trying to resolve misdemeanor cases verses more serious cases they've been acted a very fair procedure that benefits everyone the district community as well as those who are arrested on these low level misdemeanors you have a possibility of not having to go through the inconvenience of a trial and whatever might result from that you were able to pay a small fine which is a sort of a fine in retrospect and be able to go on your way in the  generally make a distinction between misdemeanors and felonies i can't say it's a perfect separation but the district of columbia does prosecute these low level crimes all as the attorney general that's right i'm sorry the district long you off as attorney general well they get this citation that tells them to report to the local precinct i think it identifies decision to go to and i think you have about fifteen days to come there and do what you're going to do next in most cases if you're eligible for citation release at that point in other words you're not a danger of some kind and you're not going to be held you will likely have the option of posting forfeit work you can determine to go to trial and there's preset aides for those citation that the court has already you know indicated to the please or i mean theoretically it could apply if you're taking if you're taken into custody off the street but you come to the station house and it's determined they were not going to hold you and that you have the option to then leave i think you would be eligible for post in forfeit i don't know how often that would occur but how many other jurisdictions have something like this across you know we scoured the states and we didn't find a lot but there are some  understanding that you could find something equivalent to it in idaho with regard to misdemeanor traffic cases although it looks like the prosecutor's involved rather than just the police in that situation in wyoming there's  forfeiting if you forfeit collateral they are however it's likely to be a guilty finding of some kind and all i could find was really the federal rule just allows local district courts to annex something and at this point michigan and pennsylvania seem to be the most explicit about the posting for why don't other jurisdictions have something like this do you think i actually think it's possible they do but it's hard to find them is  it's great you know really i think maybe i'm just a poor researcher but i think there are likely are more statutes it's very difficult to find because the terminology is so local specific and when you do searches of bond in collateral you're going to get into the basic criminal procedure of posting bond but to the extent they haven't used it they just may not have the type of urban municipality that we have i don't know in any event  you know really what this law is is a very beneficial law for everyone you know the columbia is allowed to preserve its resources for those very serious crimes keep in mind if any of these cases go to trial you're to have a police officer have to come in and testify that's going to take that person off the street you're going to have to devote a prosecutor to that particular day i mean there's a lot of resources that are spent on any trial so this is a way to preserve those resources but to maintain some deterrence and it allows criminal defendants for these low level climbs to just you know sort of understand that this isn't something that they can just get a free pass on but at the same time you know be able to find a way to get out of a situation that perhaps they just mistakenly got into and not have to worry about all of this criminal process that can occur is beneficial to everybody it's rationally related to the district's interest there's just no reason to strike as like there are no other questions thank you bow thank you your honor i understand the government pointing out some of the policy benefits of this post and for that procedure they say that everybody benefits but because of the lack of oversight there is a problem that's created for society to give an example both the government and an individual might be happy if the government said we'll offer you fifty dollars not to criticize the president and somebody who doesn't want to criticize the president say great i'm making fifty dollars and both sides are happy but that takes away an important public interest in the exercise of free speech