Jan. 30 — Bounty Hunter Billy Wells admits his profession has an image
problem.
"There's a picture that pops up your mind when you say 'bounty hunter,'" he
said. "You think of a thug."
It's an image that is not helped by regular — if infrequent — horror
stories of bounty hunters' apparent abuses and mistakes, such as the
killing of a Virginia man last month. Police say a bounty hunter with
criminal record raided the wrong home and fatally shot an innocent man. And
it's more than just an image problem for those who make their living as
skip tracers. Pressure from lawmakers is slowly reining in the storied
profession, eroding unparalleled freedoms born in the days of the Wild West.
Reality vs. ‘The Wild Bunch’
Bounty hunters are hired by bail bond agents to track down and arrest
clients who have failed to appear in court as required. They haul in an
estimated 30,000 bail jumpers every year, earning a typical fee of about 10
percent of the bail amount.
The thousands of agents working in business range from private
investigators and former police officers, to people like Crystal McElroy, a
26-year-old mother of three who works as a bounty hunter in Santa Fe, N.M.
The profession has long been a fixture of the American imagination,
appearing in movies such as The Wild Bunch, Midnight Run, and even Star
Wars. But the reality is usually not very glamorous, those in the industry
say.
Bounty hunters spend days tracking down and staking out their prey.
Professionals admit chases and high drama are rare, and many seasoned
agents say they often just call the police when they've tracked down a
particularly dangerous fugitive.
Only a few hundred agents around the country are able to support themselves
as full-time bounty hunters, experts say.
"It's a tough business," said Wells. "I recommend to people — and I always
have — don't quit your day job."
The ‘Rambo Approach’
Most bounty hunters are responsible professionals, but traditionally,
virtually anyone could enter the field, and under a Supreme Court decision
in 1872, they have enjoyed police-like powers. It's the freedom and the
racy image that have attracted some of the wrong sorts of people.
"There's a lot of people who take the 'Rambo' approach," admits Dennis
Bartlett, the executive director of the American Bail Coalition.
Something like that apparently is what happened in Virginia.
A bounty hunter named James Dickerson allegedly went to the wrong home on
Christmas Eve while pursuing a fugitive. Dickerson and another man broke
down the door, dragged a man outside and killed him, police said.
Dickerson had a criminal record; his alleged victim, Roberto Martinez, did
not.
In Virginia, as has been the case in many states, virtually anyone can work
as a bounty hunter, without obtaining a license or undergoing a background
check. Horror stories like the Martinez case are not new.
Earlier this year, two bail bondsmen in Fairfax, Va., were arrested after
allegedly taking money from a couple they had recaptured after posting bond
for them, police there reported.
In Houston last month, Thang Quoc Le pleaded not guilty to hiring a bounty
hunter to kill a man who had been seeing his wife.
Last June, a 23-year-old man died after struggling with three bounty
hunters in Kansas City. One of the men was charged with involuntary
manslaughter and pleaded not guilty.
Breaking Down the Door to Your Home — Legally
The extensive power granted to bounty hunters stems from an 1872 U.S.
Supreme Court decision, Taylor vs.Taintor. The high court ruled that a bail
bond agent or bounty hunter can pursue bail jumpers across state lines,
break into their homes, and arrest him or her at anytime.
These cases and others have highlighted the unusual police-like power and
latitude given to bounty hunters.
Last year, the Ohio Supreme Court granted bounty hunter Michael Kole a new
trial, on the grounds that he had the legal authority to arrest a defendant
"at any time or place." Kole had been convicted of abduction and burglary
after he and a partner had entered a fugitive's home and held the man at
gunpoint.
With Little Success Curtailing Their Power…
Lawmakers have repeatedly tried to curtail bounty hunters' powers,
generally without success.
Efforts were jumpstarted in 1997, after a young couple was killed in their
Phoenix, Ariz., home by men who claimed to be bounty hunters. The case
prompted Arizona to pass a law requiring bounty hunters to be licensed and
to obtain permission before entering a home.
Similar cases have periodically renewed interest in cracking down on the
profession in other states, but bounty hunters have fiercely fought such
efforts.
Bartlett and other bounty hunter advocates insist it would be impossible to
do the job without the power to make arrests and enter home without warrants.
"If you don't have some sort of coercive authority you're never going to
pick the guy up," said Wells.
Bounty hunters insist they are performing an important public function. The
bail system helps combat jail overcrowding, they argue. Police are rarely
interested in pursuing bail jumpers charged with relatively minor offenses,
so the job is left to skip tracers, industry officials say.
…States Cracks Down on the ‘Scumbag Element’
Instead of drastically limiting bounty hunters' capabilities, many states
have imposed restrictions on who can become a bail enforcement agent, as
those in the industry prefer to be called.
California, for example, passed legislation in 2000 requiring
bail-enforcement agent to receive about two weeks of training and undergo a
background check for felony convictions.
The various state restrictions create a tangle of confusion for those in
the business, though. In Texas, bounty hunters cannot carry fire arms, for
example, but in California they can. In some states they cannot carry a
badge and wear identifying clothing, but in others they are required to do so.
"There's so much gray area. Even the cops don't know what we can or can't
do," complains Wells.
For many in the industry, some restrictions such as criminal background
checks are welcome.
"What it's done is sort of driven the scumbag element out of the picture,"
says Bartlett, the executive director of the American Bail Coalition.
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