Bail Bondsmen Face New Fees

As was reported in the Las Vegas Review Journal a few weeks ago, the Las Vegas bail bonds industry has come under intense pressure from a city program. This really shouldn't come as much of a surprise. City, state and federal government bodies are looking for revenue in any and all places during these tough economic times.

The bail bonds industry is relatively easy prey. The industry's trade association yields far less power than other industry trade groups. In addition, bail bondsmen have the dubious honor of doing a necessary, but not very popular job. In other words, the public doesn't have much sympathy for bail bondsmen because their work isn't seen as altruistic.

At the end of the day, that means that when cities or states need money, it can be done on the backs of bail bondsmen with relatively little push back.

Tennessee becomes the latest state to generate fees at the expense of bail bondsmen. Robert Arnold, the Rutherford County Sheriff, began collecting an additional $5 fee for each bail bond issued earlier this month.

The sheriff believes the additional fee will generate up to an extra $70,000 annually. He planes to use the new found money for Information Technology upgrades and additional booking staffing. The bail bond agencies will be billed once a month for their prior month's bonds.

When asked, the sheriff falls back on the argument that the allows the bail bonds fee, therefore he can implement. However, there is one simple answer to the question, why is he doing this to bail bondsmen? That being, because he can. Those that have the power, make the rules.

Unfortunately, as we've seen in Las Vegas and now Tennessee, the bail bondsmen have very little power, so they have a difficult time doing much to stop the implementation of these challenging new rules.

Unless the economy strengthens dramatically in the very near future, I would expect more municipalities, states and various agencies to find novel ways to charge bail bondsmen or otherwise generate their own revenue at the expense of bail agencies.

New Connecticut Bail Bonds Law Institutes New Rules

A new law was passed in Bridgeport, Conn. last week requiring bail bondsmen to keep records of bonds and charge 10 percent fee on of the first $5,000 of the bond and 7 percent of the remainder.  As of Oct. 1st, the bail bondsman will  need to charge 35 percent of those fees down when offering payment plans with full payment to be made within 15 months.

Currently bail bondsmen are undercutting by only charging 1 to 2 percent of a bonds and at times nothing at all.  This is because of the stiff competition.

Two cases in the Bridgeport area brought the bail bonds problem out in the open.  One man while awaiting trial for a police chase spanning three states and allegedly stabbing and kidnapping his wife.  He walked out of jail, held on $1.3 million bond, after giving his bondsman a letter stating he had money he did not have.  He immediately killed his wife.  Another man was bonded out one night and shot his wife to death the next day.
To make sure bondsmen are following the new laws the state has hired special auditors to review all records of the bonds they have posted.  Each bondsman will pay an annual fee of $450 to help pay for the audits..