After seven months in a Maricopa County jail, Kelly is home, working, in therapy, and fighting his case – proof that freedom before trial changes lives.
When police arrested 37-year-old Kelly in Phoenix this past February, he knew the routine. He had struggled with addiction since he was a teenager, and this time a shoplifting charge landed him back behind bars.
“I’ve been addicted to hard drugs since I was about fifteen,” Kelly said. “I started stealing to get money and they caught me. I’ve been fighting that case since.”
This time, Kelly spent more than a month in pretrial detention on a $5,000 bail. While waiting, he experienced the harsh realities of a Maricopa County jail: overcrowding, inadequate medical care, and withdrawal symptoms without real treatment.
“They give you something for stomach pain and maybe an anti-anxiety pill, but not what you really need. You’re just laying there on the ground, not eating much. It’s hard,” he explained.
Ironically, Kelly originally moved to Arizona from Seattle to “get clean.” “But I didn’t do my homework,” he says about his move to a state that has become a hotbed for drug trafficking. “I was in and out of prison since I got there.”
In Arizona’s Maricopa County, addiction and incarceration often travel together. Roughly eight in ten people entering Arizona’s prisons report a history of substance use, according to data from the Arizona Department of Corrections. Yet treatment behind bars remains scarce.
In Arizona’s Maricopa County, addiction and incarceration often travel together. Roughly eight in ten people entering Arizona’s prisons report a history of substance use, according to data from the Arizona Department of Corrections. Yet treatment behind bars remains scarce.
Only a few of the county’s jail facilities offer medication-assisted therapy for people struggling with drug dependence – and only for those who were already enrolled in a methadone program before arrest, according to the county’s Correctional Health Services. For everyone else, the system offers far less and demands far more. Treatment all but disappears, replaced by a stark regimen of deprivation that experts say compounds both suffering and risk. For most detainees, withdrawal means little more than ibuprofen and isolation — a reflection of what researchers describe as the chronic underuse of evidence-based addiction treatment in U.S. jails and prisons.
Arizona’s geography adds another layer to the problem. Sitting along one of the country’s busiest drug-trafficking corridors, the state has long been a gateway for methamphetamine and fentanyl entering from Mexico, according to the U.S. Department of Justice and recent analyses by the Arizona Department of Health Services.
Public health officials say that the abundance of supply, combined with limited treatment access, fuels a cycle of relapse and rearrest that plays out daily in the courts and jails of Phoenix.
“There’s just not a lot of programming to better yourself in there. It makes it hard to actually get clean and want to stay clean.”
“There’s just not a lot of programming to better yourself in there,” Kelly says of this Maricopa County jail. “It makes it hard to actually get clean and want to stay clean.”
For people like him, the connection between addiction and incarceration is unmistakable. It’s woven into every part of the jail environment. When Kelly talks about the lack of programming, he’s naming a structural truth: recovery cannot take root in a place that offers neither treatment nor purpose. In most facilities, people detox alone, white-knuckling through withdrawal without counseling, medication, or even meaningful activity. And because most people are detained in jail for only a few days or weeks, there’s rarely time to stabilize or receive meaningful care.
For many, that combination – brief detention, unsupported detox, and abrupt release with reduced tolerance – drives sharply elevated risks of overdose after release. It is a tragic, though entirely foreseeable, outcome when the underlying challenges are never addressed and meaningful treatment is out of reach. The result is a system that doesn’t support sobriety so much as interrupt substance use for a few days – often worsening the danger once a person walks out the door.
Freedom before trial isn’t just a matter of justice. It’s also a chance to get well.
When he finally became eligible for bond, Kelly learned about The Bail Project from others inside the jail. “Pretty much everybody in there knows about it,” he said. “I just put in for it and got lucky.”
“Being able to fight my case from the streets instead of inside jail – it’s huge.”
Once he was released, the difference was immediate. “Being able to fight my case from the streets instead of inside jail – it’s huge,” Kelly said. “It’s going to make a huge difference in the outcome.”
Since his release, Kelly has been working, going to therapy, and attending a methadone clinic. He is living in Peoria for now while waiting for his next court date. “Staying clean and showing up to court, that’s what’s going to help my case,” he said. “I’m just trying to use all that in my favor.”
For Kelly, freedom before trial is more than a chance to prepare for court. It is a chance to rebuild his life.
We need your help to secure freedom for people trapped behind bars because of unaffordable bail.
Your support gives hope to the thousands of people still trapped in pretrial detention. We’ve supported more than 40,000 clients through free bail assistance and community-based support services like affordable housing and healthcare, and mental health services. You can help secure the freedom of thousands more.
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