One hundred people incarcerated in Philadelphia jails while awaiting trial have been released in recent weeks as part of an effort to reduce the city’s jail population amid what advocates have called “dangerous” conditions and continued staffing shortages.

Over the past five weeks, the Philadelphia Defender Association, in collaboration with the District Attorney’s Office and the First Judicial District, worked to identify a list of people charged with relatively low-level crimes and who remained in prison because they could not pay the bail. said Andrew Pappas, general manager of pretrial preparation for the Defenders.

Pappas said he and his team were “looking at the individual, looking at their big picture and saying, you know, this person doesn’t need to be locked up.”

Municipal Court Judge Karen Simmons held weekly emergency bail hearings to review cases and determine whether a person’s bail should be reduced.

In total, 19 women and 81 men facing 123 cases had their bail reduced and were released, Pappas said. About 35% received some form of pretrial supervision, he said, and about a quarter received social services, such as addiction treatment and housing support.

Those released, who faced charges ranging from drug possession and retail theft to illegal gun possession, had few, if any, prior arrests, Pappas said:

Most would likely be offered parole if convicted, and even then, he said, all are presumed innocent until then.

“They have the right not to be imprisoned before trial for a crime for which they have not been convicted,” he said.

Some people had been detained for more than six months awaiting trial, he said, while others were detained for only a few weeks. All of his cases were in the early stages, he said.

Prisons are dangerous, Pappas said, particularly amid a current and unprecedented staffing shortage of correctional officers. The personnel crisis has lasted so long that, during the summer, a Federal judge overseeing a lawsuit over prison conditions. he disdained city officials for not taking necessary steps to mitigate the problem.

While bond hearings were not held in response to that ongoing lawsuit, Pappas said, the judge overseeing the case did come to observe one day.

“Overcrowding and understaffing are not just concerns of ours,” Pappas said. “The entire system has some motivation to reduce that prison population.”

The number of people housed in Philadelphia jails has decreased dramatically over the past 10 years. About 4,500 people are incarcerated in the city’s four facilities, nearly half the number in 2015, according to Department of Corrections data.

Pappas said he would meet again with prosecutors and court officials on Nov. 18 to discuss another list of defendants. It’s unclear, he said, whether the program will continue after that.

He said the program shows that “when we work collaboratively, when we think about people as individuals and we do it safely, everyone wins.”

A spokesman for the Philadelphia courts declined to comment. The District Attorney’s Office did not immediately respond.