The Pretrial Justice Institute is a non-profit organization funded by grants, contracts and donations. The annual report provides a breakdown each year of PJI's funders and projects. In 2012, the major sources of funding include the Bureau of Justice Assistance and the Public Welfare Foundation. PJI also works on a number of projects for the National Institute of Corrections' Community Corrections Division.
Our projects all involve work to move the nation from "paper to practice" in implementing national legal standards and evidence-based practices at the pretrial justice stage of the criminal case process. This involves:
- Appropriate use of citations/summons in lieu of arrest.
- Universal screening of all defendants by a neutral agency using objective, validated risk assessment prior to initial appearance in court. This assessment is to be shared with all appropriate parties at initial appearance in court.
- Screening of arrest charges by the prosecutor to determine case merits, eligibility for pretrial diversion or problem-solving courts, or other dispositional alternatives prior to initial appearance in court.
- Appointment of defense counsel prior to initial appearance in court.
- Judicial pretrial release decisions based upon the empirically measured strengths and risks of each defendant using the least restrictive conditions required assuring appearance and community safety.
- Preventive detention after due process of defendants who cannot be supervised with reasonable expectations of community safety.
- Periodic review of those defendants detained pending trial.