Post Conviction Bond - An Innovative Partnership with the Private Surety Bail Industry

Many states across the country are grappling with prison overcrowding and the rising cost of incarceration.  As a result, convicted prisoners may be released from their sentences early and return to the public realm.  Naturally, such releases raise questions regarding public safety.

National studies continue to show that the private surety bail industry is the most effective and efficient method of pretrial release.  That's because the industry is financially and physically responsible for defendants they release on bail and instill a network of the defendant's family and friends into the bail contract.  All parties together become accountable for the defendant's appearance in court and adherence to release conditions.  This same concept can be applied to supervising and being responsible for convicted prisoners released early from prison.

When a prisoner is released from prison prior to the completion of their sentence, they are released on parole.  Conditions of parole often include things such as obeying the law, refraining from drug and alcohol use, avoiding contact with the parolee's victims, obtaining employment, and maintaining required contacts with a parole officer.  With the posting of a post conviction bond, the bail agent would work in partnership with the parole officer by financially ensuring the paroled prisoner complies with the terms of parole. 

The same principles as with a pretrial release bond would be in place with a post conviction bond: if the parolee fails to comply with any terms of parole, the court will order the bond forfeited and issue a warrant for arrest.  The bail agent then has a certain amount of time to locate the parolee and return him/her back to the custody of the court.  If the bail agent is unable to return the parolee back to the court, a financial penalty equal to the full amount of the bond would have to be paid to the court by the bail agent. 

National studies have shown that pretrial defendants released on private surety bail are less likely to commit crimes while out on bail.  The industry believes our participation with the post conviction bond will have the same results, which is a win-win for the taxpayers and a direct affect on public safety. 

Some states are already allowing the use of post conviction bonds with great success.  It is a great resource that the private surety bail industry can provide.  We hope that other states will consider using such bonds in the future.

NAPSA Conference Closed To Those Who Have a Different Viewpoint

The National Association of Pretrial Services Agencies (NAPSA) is holding its 38th annual conference and training institute in San Diego, CA September 26-29, 2010. NAPSA is a nonprofit national organization, which advocates for the pretrial release and pretrial diversion fields. In other words, they promote the use of government-funded pretrial services programs to release defendants from jail and supervise them using taxpayer dollars rather than release and supervision through the private sector.

Accredited attended the 2009 conference and paid for an "early bird" registration the first part of May of this year in anticipation of again attending an informative conference. However just this past Monday, September 20, 2010, we received a terse letter saying we were no longer welcome to attend the conference! Recently NAPSA had added a conference attendance disclaimer to their website in short stating that "by attending the NAPSA ACTI the attendee agrees with and supports the NAPSA standards." The letter Accredited received stated "your active involvement in the commercial bail bond industry and that industry's endorsement of bills that are meant to limit and restrict the mission of pretrial programs is in direct opposition to our goals and standards."

Well what exactly do NAPSA's standards state?

Standard 1.4 (f) states that "compensated sureties should be abolished." Standard 1.4 (g) goes on to state that "no defendant released under conditions providing for supervision by the pretrial services agency should be required to have bail posted by a compensated surety." Finally NAPSA has stated that "financial conditions should never be set simply by reference of a bail schedule that establishes money bail amounts based on the nature of the charge and state flatly that financial conditions should never be used in order to detain the defendant."

Never??? No matter the crime or the person's criminal history??? Just let them walk out of jail free while the citizens hope that a pretrial services officer will adequately supervise that person from their office???

The private surety bail industry has always said that there IS a role for government-funded pretrial services programs in the criminal justice system. The industry has never advocated for the elimination of such programs as they have for our industry. We believe indigent first-time and non-violent offenders should be the population pretrial services programs focus on, as these are the individuals who often don't have the financial means to get out of jail and based on their crimes, are low public safety risks to the community.

It is nearsighted for an organization like NAPSA to think that the private surety bail industry, made up of small businesses who provide a valuable service to the criminal justice system at no cost to the taxpayer, would embrace their standard of "eliminating compensated sureties," in order to attend their annual conference.

And, is booting a private citizen from their annual conference even legal? NAPSA receives a generous amount of federal funding from the U.S. Court System and U.S. Pretrial and Probation Services. These are federal tax dollars and many employees from these systems attend the NAPSA conference every year.

Unfortunately those who disagree with NAPSA's philosophy, despite being fellow criminal justice professionals, are simply not worthy of attending NAPSA's conference.

Well, there is always next year. Perhaps NAPSA will have a different viewpoint then.