Doesn’t that effectively mean the “nominal” bond is meaningless, as the 10% figure is the true bond? I wonder if this policy would lead to bond inflation.
Not meaningless. As explained, the “bond” isn’t a loan. Money does not change hands. You can post bond on assets, such as home equity. I don’t know the details of this sort of thing, but property bonds are possible, and the state winds up with a lien on the property until trial.
Of course, a person with substantial assets accused of something that isn’t THAT heinous is likely to be someone who’s going to be ROR’ed anyway.
But I think what he is saying, and it makes sense, let’s say the court sets a bond of $10k, but it is in one of those states where you can post 10% and you get it back when you show up for trial. So you deposit $1k with the court and get the $1k back after the trial.
Well, where did the $10k figure come from? It didn’t mean anything as nothing was ever contingent on $10k.
And what about a guy that can’t afford the $1k? Can I go into business accepting a non-refundable $100 to post his $1k bond with the court?
Getting arrested and thereby paying bail bondsmen is a terrible way to launder money, to say the least. And I think you have in mind civil forfeiture, which is a whole 'nother ball of wax. Look up the terms “money laundering” and “civil forfeiture” and your questions will be answered.
That bond you sign whilst drunk in the tank says “I am under your (the bondsman’s) control until I show up for court.” Thus, you have consented to him/her coming and getting you. I don’t see what the problem is… 
IIRC, one of the items specified in the contract you sign with a bondsman is that you give them the specific right to drag your butt back across whatever state lines you might have crossed when their agent catches up with you.
Here is an interesting article about a case involving a mistake by bounty hunters in New York:
Victim of Bounty Hunters Wins $1 Million By DAVID STOUT, September 13, 1996 (nytimes.com)
Jrae Mason was kidnapped in front of her house in Manhattan by bounty hunters who thought she was Audrey White Smith who had jumped bail in Tuscaloosa (Alabama). The bounty hunters slapped her in handcuffs and searched her home: they found identification for her in the name Jrae Mason, but no evidence that she could be Audrey White Smith. Then she was moved around from one NY City police lockup to another. She was locked up in one of the bounty hunters’ boat at the marina, and finally taken to the airport and kept in custody by the Port Authority police until other bail bondsmen from Alabama showed up on a plane to take her back to Alabama by car. The Alabam bail bondsmen gave her the choice of riding in handcuffs in the car or being put in the trunk if she didn’t want to cooperate.
After it was proven in Alabama that they had the wrong woman, she was given $24 for an apology and put on a bus back to New York City.
Jrae Mason brought a civil action before the court and was awarded $900,000 from the two bail-bond companies (the one in New York and the one in Alabama), $250,00 from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, and $150,00 from the City of New York.
I believe that it’s ridiculous to allow these bounty hunters powers that are greater than even those of the police.
Money certainly can change hands in the UK system.
Bail can be conditional on one or more of several factors such as living at a given address, checking in at a police station at predefined intervals or not leaving the given address between certain hours. The court, or the police, may also require a third party to stand surety for a person charged with a crime. This involves pledging a sum of money to the court to be paid in the event of the accused failing to turn up for the proceedings. If he doesn’t show the money is normally forfeit.
I say ‘normally’ because, as this recent case illustrates, the person standing surety cannot always be held responsible for the non-appearance in court of the defendant.
The third party surety must know you personally, which implies that bail bondsmen don’t feature in our bail system, but you probably know that anyway.
If I’m understanding this correctly, if you (the defendant) fail to show up, you’re now on the hook for the full $10,000 once they find you again.
And btw, clairobscur is a he.
Ok, but then, I’ve two questions :
-Are american people OK with the concept, generally speaking?
-Wouldn’t it make more sense to pick for bail an amount that people can actually pay, or put a lien on their property, rather than stating some ludicrous amount that will require the intervention of a third party and will result in the accused losing 10%, even if he shows up for trial, even if he isn’t found guilty?
Exactilly as I would if I was breaking and entering in the middle of the night, or would they benefit from extenuating circumstances (I’m not sure it’s the proper word in english)?
But how would they know that someone breaking their door in the middle of he night is doing so to proceed to a lawful arrest rather than some criminal up to no good? How thinking they’re in imminent danger wouldn’t be a reasonnable assessment of the situation, hence opening a legitimate “self-defense” defense?
I didn’t know any of this movies/series, except Blade Runner. And in blade runner, I was convinced the main character was a police officer. I’m still surprised there aren’t much more of them with bounty hunters as the main characters. Or at least more of them broadcasted over here.
OK, this isn’t Cafe Society, but I recommend you see Midnight Run. It stars Charles Grodin and Robert Deniro and is hilarious.
I think for the most part, Americans are fine with the concept of bounty hunters. It’s one of those things I’ve never personally heard any debate take place about (save for the few times bounty hunters get in legal trouble themselves for whatever reason). The accused don’t HAVE to lose 10% since I don’t think they’re required to use a bail bondsman. If they have the money themselves (which is likely for lesser crimes where the bond is much lower than the $10,000+ mentioned above) they can simply pay for the bond and get out of jail themselves.
Another problem I could foresee with putting up property on lien or paying a smaller amount is that people would still skip on the court dates (and subsequently get a warrant out for their arrest). We’d then be in the same position beforehand of having all these fugitives and no government resources to take them down (for reasons Shagnasty mentioned above). Outsourcing the tracking down and arresting job to third party bounty hunters has seemingly worked out quite well.
If you’re interested in seeing how a typical bounty hunter show operates, you can watch this Dog the Bounty Hunter episode.
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Most Americans don’t really give the matter much thought although it varies by state and region. I doubt it would be among the top 500 issues for most people.
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Many felons don’t have much property to put a lien against. Federal agents could theoretically take over the task but bounty hunters have more freedom than they do and don’t have to worry about small things like search warrants. That makes it harder for federal agents to catch a constantly moving fugitive. Of course it could be done but most of the public and law enforcement care enough to change it. Most Americans don’t have much sympathy for (accused) felons.
Not a movie, although one is said to be in the pipeline, but Janet Evanovitch has a series of novels about the most shambolic bounty hunter you could imagine, Stephanie Plum. Well worth a look, falling-off-the-chair funny.
What’s actually strange is how rarely Bounty Hunters do cause trouble, at least compared to the police. I assume the media would be all over it if they could make a story out of it.
Well here’s the the thing:
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Bail is often pretty low. For most misdemeanors a few hundred dollars will get you out of jail. Even for somewhat more serious crimes, in many states bail over $10,000 is relatively rare. For someone who is middle class posting $10,000 is not actually very difficult. Not that everyone who is middle class has $10,000 laying around–but many of them have assets they can put up for collateral.
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What this essentially means is that the overwhelming majority of people who need the services of a bail bondsman are not upper class or middle class, they are lower class people. In general the plight of the poor (especially the urban poor) is not very important to middle class and above Americans. The impression most people have of people who use bail bondsman is “they are white trash who did something stupid and needed a bail bondsman to post bail”, that isn’t an impression that earns much sympathy.
If you watch some of the documentaries on bail bondsman you’ll find that many/most of the people they are tracking down are people who can barely hold down a job, live in squalor and et cetera.
I’m not saying any of this makes it right, but people in general just don’t tend to feel much sympathy for this class of Americans.
- Bail bondsmen don’t really have “more authority” than law enforcement in my opinion. The U.S. Marshals can enter residences without any sort of warrant if they have reason to believe a fugitive is in the residence.
Bail bondsmen can do the same. But all that gives bail bondsmen the authority to do is enter the residence. Since they aren’t sworn police officers, they can see a meth lab in the residence–and only arrest the person they are after. They aren’t executing a search per se, which is why they don’t need a search warrant. In fact, letting a bail bondsman execute a search warrant would be giving them an inappropriate amount of authority.
Typically only government law enforcement entities are enforcing search warrants–search warrants are usually issued to find evidence of a crime or something, so search warrants wouldn’t even be something a bail bondsman would be interested in. Bail bondsmen aren’t trying to solve crimes, they don’t even care if their customers are guilty or innocent (note their customers are people out on bail, not convicts), all they care about is that they posted bond for these individuals and if these individuals do not show up for court they lose money.
Likewise, bail bondsmen really aren’t arresting people, either. Police have the power to arrest someone when they have probable cause or when they are enforcing an arrest warrant issued by a court (a warrant which of course requires the police show PC.) Bail bondsmen do not have this authority, they cannot make an “initial arrest” they can only “capture” those who have skipped bail when they are the entity which posted said bail, it’s as simple as that.
I don’t think people should think of bail bondsmen as “making arrests” because what they do isn’t really arresting so much as it is forcefully transporting.
It’s worth mentioning that the government is very much interested in apprehending fugitives.
The U.S. Marshals Service is a Federal law enforcement agency that is responsible for: apprehending fugitives, providing protection for Federal judges, providing protection and transportation for federal prisoners, and protecting Federal witnesses.
According to this, in 2007 alone they apprehended 36,000 Federal fugitives and 58,000 State and Local fugitives.
In general a lot of the people who “skip bail” who have been bonded out by bail bondsmen are being tried for relatively minor crimes. Misdemeanor DUI, misdemeanor possession, or even “small scale” felonies, like possession with intent to distribute and et cetera.
A lot of these people aren’t “high profile” fugitives, the government certainly wants them to come in and be tried–but not enough to expend a huge amount of resources on it. Many of these types of fugitives tend to get captured when they are arrested for some other sort of crime, or in routine traffic stops. Since they aren’t the worst/most violent offenders out there, people aren’t too worried about them.
Yes and no. In situations where you put up the cash yourself, the bond does exactly what it originally intended to do: you have a large incentive to show up to get your money back. In situations where you give 10% to a bondsman who puts up the cash, the original bond isn’t meaningless, because it gives the bail bondsman a very large incentive to help the court out by finding your ass. It’s really the 10% that’s meaningless with respect to being any kind of collateral. If he wanted, the bail bondsman could charge you a flat fee of $1 to put up your million dollar bail, and he’d still have just as much incentive to find you and get you back to court. But that’s not a very good deal for him.