The new judge in charge of the Ferguson Missouri municipal court has rescinded hundreds of arrest warrants, and has promised to make the court less abusive on poor and black people:

A new municipal judge in Ferguson, Missouri, on Monday ordered sweeping changes to court practices in response to a scathing Justice Department report following the shooting of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown a year ago.

Municipal Court Judge Donald McCullin, appointed in June, ordered that all arrest warrants issued in the city before Dec. 31, 2014 be withdrawn.

Defendants will receive new court dates along with options for disposing of their cases, such as payment plans or community service. Fines may be commuted for indigent people.

The changes come five months after the U.S. Department of Justice strongly criticized city leaders in its report, saying the police force and court worked together to exploit people in order to raise revenue.

The Justice Department specifically said Ferguson’s municipal court practices caused significant harm to many people with cases pending as minor municipal code violations turned into multiple arrests, jail time, and payments that exceeded the cost of the original ticket many times over.

Here is hoping that the reforms stick, but I doubt it.

In the long run, there is too much money in shaking poor black people in Ferguson for it to end without an outside agent forcing them to do so.