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Comment by georgeecollins | Hacker News Reader

For anyone who is not aware, in the US you sometimes have to put up bail money to get out of jail because you are a flight risk or there is a danger you will commit further crimes (assuming you are guilty which is at that point unproven). There are services that do this as a bond, called a bail bond.

You typically don't put up the full amount, maybe 5-10%. The rest of the risk of you not showing up for your trial is assumed by the bail-bondsman or some other intermediary. Since people usually show up it is a good business.

As an aside, the problem with this system-- like a lot of the US justice system-- is that it favors people with wealth.

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It's different from state to state. In IL, for example, (until recently) someone awaiting trail would give the government 10% directly and the state would act as their own bondsman as bondsmen/bounty hunters are illegal. If they were deemed a low flight risk they could also be released on an "i-bond" aka "released on your own recognisance" meaning they're just trusting you to show up to trials.

I said "until recently" because IL became the first state to entirely outlaw cash bail this past election because heavily favors the wealthy and can destroy innocent people's lives while they wait in jail for trial. Now they can only hold someone if they can demonstrate that they are likely to offend again if released.

Wow, props to IL for doing this.

Im not sure I understand correctly.

Are you saying they no longer take flight risk into account at all for release?

Do they take any consideration for ability to pay the i-bond?

You are right, thanks for the better explanation.

You also don't have to use the bail bond services if you put up the full bail. But in this case SBF and associates only put up about $4M of the nominal $250M.

>As an aside, the problem with this system-- like a lot of the US justice system-- is that it favors people with wealth.

I agree that it favors people with wealth, but don't really see a better solution, if you take that to mean detaining fewer presumably innocent people.

X People are low risk and should are released awaiting trial Y People seem higher risk but can be made low risk by providing collateral.

Eliminating Y just means more people in jail.

To a certain degree that's inevitable.

Wealth buys comfort.

Constitutionally the purpose of bail is to ensure they don't flee and aren't a danger to the community while they await trial. It's not supposed to be a punishment since they haven't been convicted of anything yet.

So wealthy non-violent offenders should have the right to sit in lavish homes with an ankle monitor until they are actually convicted.

It is also not quite universal. Oregon, for example, does not have a private bail bond system. And bounty hunting is illegal here (looking is okay, but you cannot apprehend, you will end up in jail; you must get the local police to intervene).

So you pay the bondsman $25 million which you don't get back and he puts up the rest in case you do flee?

Wouldn't it be better then to pay the $250 million (if you have it) since you will get all of it back when you show up in court?

> (if you have it)

Now you understand what business bail bondsman are actually in.

> is that it favors people with wealth

Are you sure it is just the wealth though? People get denied bail for smaller offenses like stealing from a store, because you know, they look a certain way.

People who get denied bail for robbing a store are very likely not on their first pass through the system. It's the repeat offender part that gets them denied bail. More than likely on the first pass they got RoR. Or their theft was violent. It's not just dollar amounts that count.

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