The problem
As I have listened to Rutland County citizens over the last few months, and witnessed what is happening not only in our county but across Vermont, it is undeniable that police and courts are seeing the same names again and again — offenders charged with property crimes, released, and back in front of a judge within days or weeks on a new charge. But very often they do not show up.
Business owners board up windows they have replaced three times. Families stop reporting break-ins because “nothing happens anyway.”
This is not a failure of any one officer, prosecutor, or judge. They are not to blame. Instead, it is a gap in Vermont law that leaves courts with too few tools to respond to a documented pattern of repeat offending and failure to show up for court.
Many of the offenders are back in the community committing the same crimes, some in the double digits, with no apparent fear of consequences.
This is not just a problem in Rutland. It is a challenge in Burlington, in St. Johnsbury, and throughout the state. I have interviewed well respected and experienced leaders: among them members of law enforcement at the state and local level, a state’s attorney, a probation and parole manager, a judge, and a leader in law enforcement who has seen the problem from a state policy perspective. All of them recognize a problem that needs to be fixed now.
Furthermore, as I have met with select boards, municipal and business leaders and others on the street, this lack of accountability is often first and foremost on the minds of citizens who are sick and tired of the revolving door. I am too.
The truth is that accountability can be an act of kindness.
Why the obvious fix doesn’t work
My initial instinct was simple, or maybe even simplistic: as a lesson to the offender, let a judge hold someone in jail after a third property crime. But Vermont’s Constitution (Chapter II, § 40) guarantees non-violent defendants a path to release — judges may refuse release altogether only for the most serious violent and capital offenses. A law that tried to let judges hold non-violent, repeat property offenders with no bail set and no way out would almost certainly be struck down in court. A law that gets thrown out would help no one. It wastes the state’s money on litigation and leaves victims exactly where they started.
The new approach
Instead of writing a law that picks a fight it will lose, if elected I will introduce legislation that uses the tools Vermont’s Constitution already allows, but makes them mandatory instead of optional.
If I lose my election in November, I hope that others will pick up the idea and propose a bill that becomes law sooner than later.
Under this proposal, when someone is charged with a third qualifying property crime within three years, and has either missed a court date or shows other signs of flight risk, a judge would be required to set the strongest bail and release terms the law already allows — not the lightest ones:
- A secured bail bond the defendant has to actually put money behind — not a signature and a promise, which is what a lot of repeat offenders get today. Judges decide this.
- GPS monitoring, so if someone cuts and runs, law enforcement knows.
- Weekly in-person check-ins with law enforcement.
- A fast court hearing (72 hours) if the defendant wants to contest it — so this is fair, not automatic punishment.
- A written explanation on the record if a judge decides not to apply these conditions — so there’s accountability for the decision itself, not just the defendant.
There will clearly be new expenses for Corrections, and for other elements of the criminal justice system. But it is also likely that the court docket will be lighter if there is more accountability in the process.
As with any new bill, a fiscal note estimating financial impacts would need to be attached. This should be true with any bill.
The proposal is not about being harsh. The truth is that accountability can be an act of kindness. It is about closing the loop that currently lets people walk out the door with no more than a piece of paper telling them to come back, with many of them not appearing in court the next time, and the revolving door continues. It needs to stop.
The next step
If Vermonters want judges to be able to hold repeat property offenders with no bail at all — not just the toughest bail and release terms the law allows — that requires amending the Vermont Constitution itself, a process that takes several years, legislative approval over two bienniums and a statewide vote. I support starting that conversation.
But the entire State of Vermont shouldn’t have to wait years for the accountability tools we can put in place right now. What I have proposed will address the problem now, with discussion of a possible constitutional amendment later.