SO YOU THINK YOUR BUSINESS IS OFF A LITTLE... JUST WAIT !!!

Bondsman that I know and associate with in Virginia have been experiencing a reduction in business, which very likely carries over to the Fugitive Recovery field as well. Reasons and excuses for our Virginia business being "off" is generally blamed on the recent influx of new bondsmen and activities within the judicial system in our state as relates to our specific business.

DCJS took over the bonding (Private Security business) and recovery business several years ago and initially it seemed to be a good thing since it "cleaned up" the industry... as you all are probably aware, you previously were able to be a 'Felon' and still be a bondsmen and a lot of the people in our field probably had a 'rap' sheet longer than the defendants we were bonding...

There was an initial reduction on a large scale when the state and DCJS instituted the qualifications... ie. tests and licensing requirements along with "higher" fees and regulations... we all saw the number of licensed agents drop dramatically... but then, a slow but steady stream of "new meat" began moving in and as happens often... the pool began to expand and expand and continues as the field is diluted.

There are however more sinister and dangerous happenings within our industry that could eventually mark the end of or at least a major decline in our business and they are taking place all over the country so this is not specific to Virginia.

Today, I read the following article; I paste it here as it was published... the author is at the head of the post... it is rather lengthy but I think important.

PLEASE NOTE VIRGINIANS.... THE LITTLE ITEM ON LYNCHBURG VIRGINIA...
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"Alternative courts gain ground for petty criminals"

By Donna Leinwand; USA TODAY

Cities and counties increasingly are creating innovative community courts to deal with the growing number of habitual petty criminals that police call "frequent fliers." Criminals who are arrested repeatedly for crimes such as public drunkenness, trespassing and panhandling are crowding jails and sapping police resources, officials say. The cost of handling small-time criminals who cycle in and out of jail is becoming a more pressing problem for communities as budgets tighten and jail populations swell. The new courts sentence "frequent fliers" to treatment plans and social services, such as mental health and substance abuse treatment, instead of jail.

"It's the new frontier," says Amy Solomon, who studies criminal justice at The Urban Institute in Washington. "There is a new realization and recognition" that incarceration is not the best solution. "I think it'll grow and continue to pick up."

Lincoln (Neb.) Police Chief Tom Casady says that his list of people arrested more than 200 times each has grown from 17 in 2002 to 83. "The overall impact of the 'frequent flier' on the criminal justice system is great," Casady says. "If you can stop that trend in one way or another, there's a huge amount of money that can be conserved" — perhaps thousands of dollars in Lincoln alone.
Cities began taking low level crime seriously in the 1990s, says Greg Berman, director of the Center for Court Innovation. Now communities — many with overcrowded jails — must deal with these offenders.

In the last two years, community courts have opened in Lynchburg, Va., Santa Monica, Calif., and San Antonio. Among courts set to open:
• Orange County, Calif., will open a community justice center in August. Defendants will have access to 24 social service agencies, including substance abuse treatment, housing and a mobile pharmacy. Police officers may choose not to charge offenders who agree to seek treatment.

"What we needed to do is revamp the way we handle these individuals," Superior Court Judge Wendy Lindley says.

• Newark will open the first phase of its community court project this summer, says Julien Neals, the city's attorney.
Last year, the existing court system handled about 500,000 disorderly person offenses, up from 480,000 the previous year, Neals says. Many of the offenders are unemployed or have alcohol, drug or mental health problems, he says. Community court staff will screen defendants to identify their problems and link them with services instead of jail or fines.

• Athens-Clarke County in Georgia will open the Treatment and Accountability Court in July. Mentally ill offenders will be sentenced to treatment plans instead of jail, Superior Court Judge David Sweat says. Completing treatment and tasks will bring rewards, such as bus passes and food coupons, while failures will bring sanctions such as jail time or more contacts with probation officers, he says.
An analysis of the county's overcrowded jail in August 2007 found most of its male inmates had been there before — on average, 10 times in the past 15 years, says court administrator Tracy BeMent. One inmate was on his 112th visit.

"The judges finally realized this isn't working," says Probate Judge Susan Tate. "We sentence them, we set them loose, and they're right back in here."
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I will close this here but follow up with my take in the next post.

_________________
Bill Marx, Sr.
"FREE STATE BAIL BONDS"
"FREE STATE INVESTIGATIONS"
DCJS: 99-176979
Cell: 434-294-0222

"Endeavor to Persevere" "Lone Watie"

"Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that , comes from bad judgment" "Will Rogers"

Continued from previous..........

When DCJS gets in bed with "Court Services" and they determine that the answer to overcrowding in the jails is to ship the defendants off to a "Social Rehabilitation" center or whatever the name may be at the time.......... we in the bonding industry will be directly affected.

The results will be and have already been........... Much more PR with court services being attached to the recognizance... lower or no bonds. This is happening to a great degree in northern and central Virginia... the "BIG" urban areas... just ask any true bondsman that has been in the business for more than a few years and he will tell you his business as a whole is "OFF"

There has always been competition in our business... that's never been an issue with me.... I have faced over the years much "cut throat" deals and "snaked" bonds along with bondsmen that will pull a bond on you in a heartbeat... I will tell you that although it pisses me off.... and in some very few cases I will actually confront the other bondsman... generally I just let it go.... well, we are gonna have to fight for our business from now on cause it's gonna get more and more difficult to write these bonds unless you are willing to really get out their and work.... THE DAYS OF SITTING IN YOUR OFFICE AND WAITING FOR YOUR PHONE TO RING ARE FAST SLIPPING AWAY... you better be upgrading your phone book advertising.... putting out little road signs... handing out card everywhere you go... (although it is supposedly against the law to do this around a jail or courthouse) and in fact sitting in the courtroom listening and watching and LEARNING the ropes of the system. Getting to know on a first name basis your local magistrate and NOT PISSING OFF THE WRONG PEOPLE.... like judges, magistrate and other LE.

I don't know if there is anything that we as individual bondsmen or recovery people can do to curb this trend in our industry... but we can work smarter in many ways to "upgrade" our exposure and improve the overall look and take on our business.

I alway bring this point to bare whenever I am in the company of anyone remotely associated with our business... ie: judges, lawyers, magistrates or any other LE people... and that point is simply this:

"OUR BUSINESS COSTS THE STATE AND THE LE COMMUNITY ABSOLUTELY NOTHING... we receive no funds from any agency or affiliation involved in the system and the services we provide absolutely free up resources within LE that can be much more effectively applied to other much more important areas of dealing with crime, enforcement and application of punishment."

There is only one reason the state system is getting more involved with our business and that reason is money.............. keep that in your forefront... cause that is the bottom line and theirs too.

_________________
Bill Marx, Sr.
"FREE STATE BAIL BONDS"
"FREE STATE INVESTIGATIONS"
DCJS: 99-176979
Cell: 434-294-0222

"Endeavor to Persevere" "Lone Watie"

"Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that , comes from bad judgment" "Will Rogers"

Bill
The pre-trial release or court services are negatively effecting all of us. They want to save money, so they create an entire bureaucracy that comes out of somebody else's budget.

It does not make sense to me. Lenient judges allow the continuation of crime. If a defendant knows that if he breaks the law he is going to get slammed, he will not break the law or go somewhere more lenient. As it is, in my opinion, there is no deterrent to crime.

Scott

_________________
R.E. "Scott" MacLean III

"Leaders are like Eagles, you never see them in a flock, but one at a time"

Chesapeake Group Investigations, Inc.
Chesapeake Bail Bonds
877-574-0500
301-392-1100 (fax)
301-392-1900 (Office)

Pre-Trial and "alternative" services are certainly a major threat to the entire bail bond industry nation-wide.

In Washington as well as many other states, we are dealing with the influx of "deposit bail". That is, courts will require a bond (ie: $5,000) or cash deposit that is usually 10% of the bond (ie: $500), which is what the bail companies are statutorily required to charge due to insurance regulations. That effectively eliminates the bail company and also negates the reason for requiring the $5,000 in the first place. No collateral or liability is required and the defendant has no incentive to appear. This activity is encouraged by private companies such as Government Payment Services (aka: GPS, Government Payment EXP) who state that they are not facilitating bail because they only provide a terminal in the jail or court by which you can use your card to place money on a defendant's books. Yet in looking through their website, you can clearly see that a repeated effort is made to market bail as a significant reason for implementing their services. One quote listed on their site was from a circuit court in IL boasted that they had brought in $9 MILLION in bail revenue in a year and a half.

This approach has been practiced in Oregon, which as a result, suffers HUGE amounts of outstanding warrants.

Coming soon to a state near you...

The rest of the country has just started doing what the District of Columbia courts has been during for more than thirty years. A police officer can arrest a suspect 9:00 am and see the same suspect walk past him in courthouse at 12:00pm on personal bond.

_________________
Domestic Security Investigations
P.O. Box 4462
Rockville, MD 20849
Tel: 1-800-387-0787
Anti-Moral Majority Club President
"Fear not the unknown, Fear the person who controls the unknown" Gene 7:14