RESEARCH BRIEF - Desk Appearance Tickets and Appearance Rates - The Benefits of Court Date Reminders - No. 45 - July 2019

Sep 17, 2026

Uploaded by Noah

Research brief examining how improving Desk Appearance Ticket (DAT) court appearance rates can reduce failure to appear (FTA) and associated costs. The brief reviews DAT issuance patterns in New York City, compares arraignment FTA rates for DATs versus summary arrests, and summarizes a randomized controlled trial testing court date reminder phone calls. Findings focus on how reminder calls delivered by CJA can substantially lower initial court-date nonappearance, including the operational approach used during vendor bankruptcy.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages8

Reading Time20 min

AccessFree to download

How can we improve DAT appearance rates?

What are DATs and how they relate to arraignment

DAT issuance volume and trends

Failure to appear (FTA) rates for DATs at arraignment

CJA’s live reminder call center

Randomized controlled trial of court reminders to DAT defendants

RESEARCH BRIEF: Desk Appearance Tickets and Appearance Rates —The Benefits of Court Date Reminders Providing reminder phone calls to individuals given a DAT can reduce failure to appear at the first court date by nearly half By Russell Ferri No. 45 | July 2019 How can we improve DAT appearance rates? ReduCityc’ngjailpretrpopuialal dtietenon aodisosae crRiuckeiarsl IpsalratnfNew YoThe userf’sdpelastaopplowearearne tickets (DATs) to replace some summary arrests is central to those goals. However, issuing more DATs may come at the cost of a lower court appearance rate, as DAT defendants are at greater risk of not showing up for arraignment. What can be done to address this problem? DATs may be unfamiliar to some of those outside of New York’s criminal justice system. Across the country, most jurisdictions have both custodial arrests and non-custodial arrests. New York State is somewhat unusual in also having something in-between: DATs. For some arrests, mostly misdemeanors, the arresting officer can issue the arrestee a DAT. This allows the arrestee to go home from the precinct and return for the arraignment at a later date. Such an arrest is still best thought of as “custodial,” however, because the arrestee must remain at the police precinct while the officer fingerprints him and checks for any outstanding warrants, orders of protection, or other disqualifying factors. But, if given a DAT, the arrestee can go home sooner and work through his case while released in the community. The rate of DAT issuance in NYC has fluctuated widely over the years, but beginning in the late 2000s policymakers made an effort to issue more DATs. The State’s bail reform legislation includes policies that would likely increase the rate of DAT issuance even further. New York City has maintained high appearance rates for individuals whose cases began with a summary arrest. In recent years, approximately 85 percent of such individuals return to court for all their appearances. The City and CJA provide a variety of services to achieve that high appearance rate, including court date reminders and Supervised Release. The story is a bit different for DATs. In recent years, approximately 25 percent of individuals fail to appear for their initial arraignment. While a considerable improvement from the early 1990s—when the DAT arraignment FTA rate was often around 40 percent—New York City will need to further improve the DAT appearance rate to minimize the costs of FTA to defendantsand the court system. One possible way to reduce the FTA rate is to remind individuals of their upcoming appearance. CJA has provided reminders for decades. In recent years the Agency has subcontracted much of this service to a vendor. In September 2017 that vendor informed CJA of its imminent bankruptcy. Exploiting this opportunity, we conducted a randomized controlled trial (RCT) of the effectiveness of reminders. This brief explains the results of that RCT for DAT arraignments. Volume of DATs The volume of DATs has increased in recent years. Since 2000 volume has ranged from a low of 16,338 (in 2000) to a high of 89,464 in 2014. Beginning in 2015 the volume has dropped due to several policy changes, among them a shift toward giving many individuals found with small amounts of marijuna a summons rather than a DAT. Figure 1 Rate of DATs DATs have also increased as a percentage of all custodial arrests (i.e., DATs and summary arrests combined) . From 2000-2002 DATs only made up approximately five percent of custodial arrests annually. Since 2013 DATs have made up approximately one quarter of custodial arrests annually, with 2014 being the peak (26 percent) . Figure 2 DAT Volume-Percentage of Arrests, 2000-2017 5% 2000 26% 2014 25% 2017 3 Failure to appear rates for DATs at arraignment The FTA rate at DAT arraignments has varied widely since 2000. In the early 2000s it was typically around 15 percent. In recent years, the ra

FAQs

What are Desk Appearance Tickets (DATs) and why do they matter for court attendance?

DATs allow certain arrestees to go home and return later for arraignment. The brief explains that DAT defendants face higher risk of failing to appear at the first court date, making appearance improvement important.

How do DAT appearance and failure-to-appear rates compare with summary arrests?

The brief reports that about 25% of individuals fail to appear for initial DAT arraignment in recent years, which is higher than for summary arrests. It also notes that DAT FTA rates increased roughly alongside DAT volume.

How did the randomized controlled trial evaluate court date reminders for DAT defendants?

After a vendor bankruptcy, CJA used the situation to test reminder effectiveness. Eligible participants had a DAT and a phone number; the study ran from November 6, 2017 through January 26, 2018, and key findings are presented in the brief.

Sep 17, 2026

Uploaded by Noah