OAR-Jefferson Area Community Corrections Pretrial Program provides pretrial service for the City of Charlottesville, the Counties of Albemarle, Nelson, Orange, Fluvanna, Louisa, Madison and Greene as wells as both the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail and the Central Virginia Regional Jail.

The program’s primary goal is to reduce the pretrial jail population. The program accomplishes this goal in two ways.

• The first is to provide information and risk assessment to judicial officers so that bond decisions are made with the most complete information available in order to ensure that equitable and safe release decisions are made. Also, to ensure the least restrictive terms and conditions of bail are set that reasonably assure a defendant will appear in court and not present a danger to themselves or the community during the pretrial stage.
  
• The second is to provide pretrial supervision to monitor compliance with pretrial bond conditions to mitigate risk factors and good behavior and to ensure appearance in court.

This will be accomplished through the application of Evidence Based Practices which include six critical Constitutional, Federal and State Legal Principles.

• Presumption of Innocence
• Right to Counsel
• Right to Against Self-incrimination
• Right to Due Process of Law
• Right to Equal Protection Under the Law
• Right to bail that is not Excessive

Currently, the pretrial program has an 80% success rate of offenders appearing in court for trial and/or sentencing. By safely and equitably diverting the appropriate defendants from the jail prior to trial, defendants are afforded all of their legal rights when accused of a crime. Pretrial supervision provides a low cost alternative to incarceration benefiting the defendant and the community.

LOCAL PROBATION PROGRAM

The local probation program provides supervision for misdemeanor and class 5 and 6 felony offenders in accordance to the Comprehensive Community Corrections Act. Our population’s probation is the result of the suspension or deferral of up to a maximum of a twelve month jail sentence per offense. Our program provides probation supervision in service to the Circuit Court, General District Court, and the Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court of the city of Charlottesville and the counties of Albemarle, Fluvanna, Goochland, Greene, Louisa, Madison, Nelson and Orange.

The goals of the program are:

• Public safety;
• Provide an alternative to incarceration;
• Reduce recidivism; and
• Be a change agent in the life of the offender.

The successful completion of supervision would consist of the offender’s completion of court ordered obligations, compliance with probation standards and good behavior. Ideally, for medium and high risk offenders, their change process begins toward living a more productive, positive, and crime-free lifestyle.

When successful, our community becomes safer, our tax burden is lessened, and the lives of our offenders are positively impacted.