Blog

After spending the weekend at home in Indy, I boarded a direct flight to LAX Sunday night. I sat across from Reggie Miller (#31) on the flight across country, he never said a word. Reggie will forever be treated like the rock star he is, in Indiana. American Surety has a number of agents in California and I wanted to visit as many as I possibly could before winding down this year’s travel schedule. As was the case during my time in Colorado last week, where I was able to attend the second meeting ever of the Rocky Mountain Bail Bond Agents, I got wind that a year end meeting of the San Diego County Bail Agents Association was being held at the The Butcher Shop Restaurant on Tuesday. I…

  The defeat of Proposition 102 in November was asetback to the advancement of commercial bail in Colorado. Prop.102 would have limited the use of free release to first time offenders and created a safer environment for Coloradans while increasing the use of secured bail bonds. Bail bond agents and sureties doing business in the Rocky Mountain state will now work to find a way forward.   I was travelling in Colorado last week, this time with a travel buddy, Gary Logue. Gary is Assistant Vice President for American Surety Company, in charge of Underwriting. He’s been with the company for 20 years and is a valuable asset.   Our objective for this trip was to meet with every ASC agent, review their client files and make sure they were in compliance…

The bail bondsmen of Georgia surely know on which side their bread is buttered. As one person put it, in Georgia, “bondsmen serve at the pleasure of their sheriff”.   Considering this, it should come as no surprise GAPB holds it’s Annual Conference in the same city and hotel as does the Georgia Sheriff’s Association.    GAPB rolls out the red carpet hosting a special evening of dinner and dancing exclusively for Georgia sheriffs.  The big event was held at the Warehouse on River Street in downtown Savannah. The evening was sponsored, in part, by American Surety Company. ASC also contributed a Big Green Egg Smoker; Sherriff Thomas Brown of DeKalb County held the winning ticket.   Meeting Notes Attorney Matt Tucker was retained as GAPB’s legal counsel while Beverly Iseghohi, the Association’s lobbyist, had…

During my recent stop in Memphis I found the bail bond market there to be but a shadow of its former self. No more bail bond agents hustling bonds in the basement of the courthouse or visiting inmates. Pretrial Release is accepting more and more defendants into their program which grants release at the taxpayer’s expense. Bonding companies have either shut their doors or let go a number of their agents adding to the seeming lack of activity in and around the courthouse. I have roots in Memphis; our family lived there in the early to mid-seventies. My father, Jack Whitlock, owned Allied Bonding Company and did a bustling business. On occasion I would make a Saturday morning trip down Poplar Avenue with my Dad to spend the morning at this office. Those Saturday morning visits…

I knew when I originally planned this recent trip it would be very taxing on me personally and to my fellow road warriors in the bail bond industry. State bail agent associations typically do not plan their events around events held in other states. So, when I took a look at the week of October 15, I saw trouble ahead, California, South Carolina and Texas would all be holding year end meetings this same week. The challenge was on. The California Bail Agents Association held their 31st Annual Convention at Bally’s Las Vegas, October 17-19. The South Carolina Bail Agents Association held their 2010 Annual Conference in Columbia, October 20, while the Professional Bondsmen of Texas held their Annual Convention at The Menger Hotel in San Antonio, October 20-23. (Photos) My week began…

It seems like only yesterday I was in Denver attending a very brief, but required hearing to advance a ballot initiative in Colorado. As I reported to my readers at that time, an organization called Safe Streets Colorado was pushing an initiative to limit the use of Pretrial Services to first time criminal offenders and misdemeanants. Getting an initiative on the November ballot, Safe Streets Colorado would require obtaining nearly 75,000 validated signatures on petitions in support of the initiative. A daunting task, but with the help of the Americans for the Preservation of Bail (APOB), Colorado bail agents’ and concerned citizens’; 172,000 signatures were submitted to the Secretary of State on August 2nd.  According to APOB this is the most signatures ever submitted in support of a ballot initiative in Colorado’s…

Another hearing on reinstating commercial bail in Oregon and a WSBAA meeting in Fife, Washington put me in the Upper Northwest last week. The American Bail Coalition is in its third year of an effort to bring commercial bail back to Oregon, after nearly forty years, offering an additional release option to judges interested in guaranteeing a defendant returns for trial. Jerry Watson testified before a joint committee on September 22 at the State Capitol in Salem. As expected, he did an excellent job articulating the merits of commercial bail and its positive impact both from a fiscal and public safety standpoint. The bill draft is currently in the hands of Legislative Counsel and yet to be filed. This being the case, Committee Co-Chairs Barker and Prozanski were taken aback when Sheriff…

In late August I was the invited speaker at the Rotary Club in Griffith, Indiana. The engagement was arranged by Luis Rojas, a licensed recovery agent northeastern Indiana.  There were local law enforcement officials, namely the Griffith Police Chief, who were interested in learning more about bail bond insurance impacting the County Extradition Fund. As I’ve written many times, deposit bail is used by a number of Indiana Courts to the detriment of Indiana residents. The extensive use of deposit bail also directly impacts, adversely so, the County Extradition Fund. In most states, revenue generated through the payment of bail bond forfeitures is deposited to the state or county general fund. In Indiana a bail bond forfeiture is comprised of two segments, the first 80% is considered a Late Surrender Fee while the…

Even the suffocating heat of Texas in August could not wilt the enthusiasm and giving spirit of the golfers and volunteers participating in the 21st Annual Steven G. Whitlock Memorial Golf Tournament. Bondsmen from throughout Texas and across the country converged on Woodhaven Country Club in Fort Worth August 4th to help raise money for Camp Esperanza, a summer camp that hosts 140 kids battling cancer. The cost of sending a kid to Camp Esperanza is approximately $500 and it is the sole focus of SGW to underwrite the cost of sending as many kids as possible to summer camp. These kids, who deal with the difficulties of their struggle with cancer throughout the year, look forward to a week of stress free fun with their fellow soldiers. We are here to help…

Each year the PBUS Board of Directors has the undeniable challenge of selecting a venue for their Mid-Year meeting (the PBUS winter conference is always in Las Vegas) that will be both accommodating for meetings and attractive to attendees who want something interesting to do in their free time.  All this to entice bail agents into spending a few days of their valuable summer months attending a conference.   Past summer conference locales include West Palm Beach, Seattle, San Antonio and San Diego.  With so many great locations to choose from why select a city in a state that has not allowed commercial bail bonds for more than forty years?   As a travel destination Chicago offers a plethora of things to hold one’s attention.  Downtown is clean and safe. …