Baker administration seeks reform of Massachusetts “dangerousness” statutes

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — In Springfield, the Baker administration on Wednesday heard chilling personal testimony about the horrors of domestic violence.

The testimony came as Governor Baker seeks to tighten laws to keep people charged with dangerous crimes, locked up until their cases are resolved.

At a victim’s roundtable at the Springfield YWCA, a domestic violence victim told her horrific story.

“He pulled me by my hair. He drug my head down. I swerved off the road. And he punched me in my face in front of my kids. Immediately I felt my eye swell up and I felt warmth dripping down my face,” the victim said.

The Baker administration is seeking  to update rules around dangerousness hearings, the mechanism that allows judges to hold a defendant behind bars, without bail, before trial.

Baker’s bill expands the list of criminal charges that would allow a judge to consider dangerousness.

And if a defendant is deemed dangerous, the bill would keep the defendant held through trial, not the current 90 to 180 days.

The victim told the Governor, her abuser is still on the streets.

“There is still that sense of fear, getting up getting the kids out the house for school. You don’t know where he is. And the fact he wasn’t held, and there is proof, is very discouraging. Very, very discouraging,” she said.

Last month, a judge set bail at $10,000 for a Danvers man after child porn was allegedly discovered in a secret room in his apartment during renovations, prosecutors asked for 500-thousand.

The Governor’s office tweeted its frustration that Massachusetts law could not find the man dangerous and hold him on no bail.

“It speaks volumes to the problem that the courts have in not having enough tools at their disposal to take an individual like that, and to make sure that person is held until his case is disposed and is behind a wall because that person could definitely threaten the safety and well being of children,” said Lt. Governor Karyn Polito.

This is the second time Governor Baker has filed this bill.

He is making it, his final legislative priority.

“We are failing victims here in the Commonwealth, over and over and over again. And we’ve been doing it for years,” Governor Baker said. “These aren’t scenarios. These aren’t made up. They are real stories from real people.”

If this reform bill is to be enacted, it’ll have to happen soon. The current legislative session expires at the end of July.

The Governor hopes what the victims are saying, will make all the difference.

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