What are bail bonds?
If you or someone you know has been arrested, a bail bondsman is a person who can help get you out of jail. Although their services are invaluable, many people aren't exactly sure how they work.
What is a bail bond?
Bail is an amount of money that the court requires you to put up to be released from jail while awaiting trial. If you can't afford to pay it yourself, a bail bondsman will post the bail for you. In exchange, he will charge a non-refundable fee, usually 10 percent of your bail amount.
*For example, if your bail is $10,000, you'll pay a $1,000 fee to get out of jail.*
In addition to the fee charged by the bondsman, there may also be other fees involved that could include collateral or interest charges.
How can bail be set?
Bail can be set in several ways, including:
- Cash bail: Pay the dollar amount of the bail-in cash. If you show up for all court appearances, the money is returned to you within a couple of months after the case is completed.
- Bail bond: You pay a fee — typically equal to 10% of the bail amount — to a bail bondsman. The bondsman then pays the full bail amount to the court on your behalf, and you get out of jail until your trial date. If you show up for all court appearances, the bondsman gets his money back from the court when your case is completed. But if you don't show up and flee, he keeps whatever money he has paid on your behalf.
How does a bail bond work?
Let's say you have a friend who was arrested and his bail was set at $10,000. You don't have enough money in your bank account to cover the full amount so you contact a bail bondsman. The bondsman posts a Wethersfield bail bond for the full amount with the court so your friend can be released from jail. In return for posting this bond and getting your friend out of jail, you pay the bondsman a fee (usually around 10% of the total bail). If your friend skips town and fails to show up in court, they're on the hook for paying the full bail amount — unless they hire a bounty hunter to track down your friend.
How helpful can bail bonds be?
A charge of a criminal offense is not always equal to a conviction. Many people who are arrested and charged with a crime have no prior record. They have always been law-abiding citizens up until this point and don't understand the process or what may happen next.
Bail bonds allow people to get out of jail while they await their trial date. This means they can continue working, taking care of family responsibilities, and going about their daily life while they wait to go before the judge.
In some cases, a judge will set bail at a very high amount. This happens when he or she believes that the person is a flight risk or poses some other danger to society if released. In these cases, most people don't have enough money in savings to cover the bail-in total.
This is where bail bonds come into play. Bail bondsmen offer these bonds for people who need them in return for a fee and sometimes collateral.
If the defendant shows up for his or her court appearances and abides by any special conditions of release, then the bail bond will be dissolved after all court appearances are completed.
If the defendant does not show up for court, then the bail bondsman may require collateral from the co-signers who put up for bail.
Bail bonds are what people visiting the criminal justice system call their bail court bonds. The other kind of bonds are sometimes called surety bonds, where companies pay a premium to the government should they fail to meet the terms of their contract. These types of bonds aren't like that; rather, they are a way for those who are accused of crimes to be released from jail after paying an amount of money set by the court.
Address: 1290 Silas Deane Hwy Suite 3F, Wethersfield, CT, 06109
Phone: (860) 881-2653