In this Google Live Event San Diego criminal defense lawyer David Shapiro explains what it means to bail out of jail. Do you have a question of your own? Post it to the comments section below or visit [ Ссылка ].
Michael – My grandson was arrested for fighting and asked me to bail him out of jail. I’ve never dealt with this before. I have no idea what bail costs, how to pay bail, or what happens afterward. What does it mean to bail out of jail?
Law Office of David P. Shapiro
3500 5th Avenue, Suite 304,
San Diego, CA 92103
619-295- 3555
Full transcription:
- We're with David Shapiro, David is a criminal defense attorney in San Diego, he's agreed to answer an online question that was posted. This specific question was to related to bail. David, with that said, here's the question, and this is from Michael, Michael said "My grandson was arrested for fighting "and asked me to bail him out of jail. "I've never dealt with this before. "I have no idea of what bail costs "how to pay bail, or what happens afterward. "What does it mean to bail out of jail? What do I do?"
- Okay, Michael, let's first start assuming that this is a California State court case. What bail is, is this: Bail, the purpose of bail is to ensure, basically, that the person is going to come back to court and to protect the community. So, the purpose of bail, sir, is two-fold. To ensure your grandson is gonna come back and to make sure that there's enough of an investment and conditions related to that bail so the community kind of feels like they're safe and can be equally as safe if he's out of custody as opposed to being in jail. So, when you bail someone out you could go pretty much one of three ways. The least common way is to use a property bond. So that's if the bail is $10,000, you need to show $20,000 of equity in a property. That takes some time, you have to get stuff appraised and it's just more of a headache, really, than it needs to be. The second way to go about bailing someone out of custody is if you post that money. So, say the bail is $10,000, you post $10,000 bail. Now, it's worth noting that whether it's property, a lien on your property, or whether it's the cash bail that you post, if the person does not show up to court and bail is forfeited that money gets kept, that lien on the property gets kept. No matter happens with the case, if the person shows up and even if they're convicted, at the end of the case that bail will be what's known as exonerated. What that means is you would get that money back in its entirety, the lien would be lifted off your home or property or whatever the case may be. The third and most common way people bail out in California, particularly in San Diego, is through a bail bondsman. Bail bondsmans basically will take anywhere from seven to 10 percent of the bail, they keep that for their own payment and they put up the rest as basically a surety that the person, in this case your grandson I believe it was, would actually come back. So, say your grandson's bail is 10,000. If you're like, hey, I don't have $10,000 liquid to post cash bail or I don't have that property or don't want that burden on my property, I just wanna go through a bail bondsman, then what you do is you contact a bail bondsman and in all likelihood they will charge you, like I said seven to 10 percent. So if it's a $1,000 bond, you pay the bondsman, lets say keep the math clean, 10%, that's $1,000 goes to the bondsman. That bail company will put up the rest assuming your grandson, obviously as a condition of your grandson showing up. Your grandson shows up, he does what he needs to do, the case is done. Whether it's dismissed, whether he's convicted, somewhere in between, whatever happens. At the end of the case you don't get that $1,000 that you paid the bail bondsman back. That's a cost of doing business with the bail bondsman for them to put up that other 9,000 as a surety. Okay, so a lot of times people have that situation where they bail a loved one out of jail and no charges are filed, and they're like, hey but I had to pay $5,000 to the bail bondsman. There's no court, why do I need to keep doing that? Well, that's a contract between you and the bail bondsman. So you could be sued civilly if you don't, basically, adhere to the terms of your contract with them. It's not really something I get too involved in but it's something to be considered. You're on the hook for 10% if you go through bail bondsman no matter what happens with the case. If your grandson wouldn't show up at court in the future then the bail bondsman may come after you for some money if you're the third party involved here basically to help defray or deflect some of their costs that the court may impose on them.
