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In an exclusive interview with Fox 31 News, the bail bondsman who arranged the surrender says they were looking for Manual Santistevan on an unrelated case.

He says they got in contact with Santistevan through his family and arranged the surrender.

The bail bondsman says Santistevan wanted witnesses because he was concerned police might hurt him. Santistevan is the third suspect arrested in the so-called Hooded Safe Bandits robberies.

Police earlier arrested his brother, Roman Santistevan, and Ishmael Mosely. The three are believed to be responsible for more than 20 armed robberies at metro area fast food restaurants and stores. Santistevan was also wanted in connection with a high speed chase last week.

The bail bondsman, who does not want his real name used says Santistevan told him that he was not involved in the robberies. And the bail bondsman says Santistevan told him that he sped away from an undercover officer because he did not realize it was the police.

According to search warrant documents, Mosley confessed to at least some of the robberies.

The arrest warrants in the Santistevan cases are sealed, but police say they have solid reasons to believe that both Santistevan brothers are involved.

Gary ‘Jock’ McKenzie, 25, faces UDA membership charges resulting from a dress rehearsal for a paramilitary show of strength last year in north Belfast.

He and a number of others, among them Ihab Shourki, were arrested during a police raid at the Alexandra Bar.

A Crown barrister said on he had no objection to McKenzie going on holiday on 3 September.

McKenzie was one of a number of people who left north Belfast last August for England following a stand-off with members of the mainstream UDA.

He has had his bail conditions altered a number of times in the past, including allowing him to live in exile.

Essex County Assignment Judge Patricia Costello has told the judges who hear criminal cases in her county to end the practice of approving bail reductions in off-the-record conferences with attorneys and to obtain written consent from prosecutors before reducing bail. She has also told them to verify defendants’ immigration status.

“There is a chill in the air when it comes to bails,” Michael Robbins, a criminal defense attorney, told The Star-Ledger of Newark for Monday’s newspapers.

The execution-style killing of three young people hanging out in a schoolyard caused an outcry in Newark, a city accustomed to violence.

Three men and three teenagers have been charged in the Aug. 4 murders of Terrance Aeriel, 18; Dashon Harvey, 20, and Iofemi Hightower, 20. Aeriel’s sister, 19-year-old Natasha, was shot in the back of the head but survived and has helped police identify suspects.

One of the men charged is 28-year-old Jose Carranza, an illegal immigrant from Peru. He was released from jail in May after being charged with repeatedly sexually assaulting a child. He made bail after it was reduced from $300,000 to $150,000. A bail bondsman posted the entire amount.

Last week, state Attorney General Ann Milgram ordered law enforcement officials in the state to notify federal authorities when they have reason to believe a suspect is in the country illegally.

Essex County Executive Joseph DiVincenzo said he was concerned that the trend could result in overcrowding the county jail. The facility, which has a capacity of about 2,200, has been hovering between 1,950 and 2,100 inmates, he said.

One defense lawyer, Sebastian Bio, says he fears the Legislature might limit the discretion of judges to lower bail.

“A higher bail and deportation may have averted this particular heinous act,” Bio said, “but it won’t solve the problem of crime in Newark or crime in New Jersey in general.”

Mr. Bain is awaiting a re-trial for the murder of his family.

He was released on bail on 15 May after the Privy Council found there had been a miscarriage of justice in his 1995 conviction. He had spent the past 12 years in prison after being convicted of killing his father, mother, and three siblings in a mass shooting at the family home in Dunedin on 20 June 1994.

On 21 June, 2007, the Solicitor General announced a retrial would be held.

Mr. Bain had been living in Waikato with long time supporter Joe Karam under the condition that Mr. Karam would stay there most of the time.

But Mr. Karam says he has been traveling a lot to prepare for the case. He says Mr. Bain will now live with Deborah Read, the daughter of one of his staunchest supporters.

Mr. Karam says Mr. Bain began studying for the design qualification in prison and needs to be near a polytech to finish it.

He says the Reads have been friends with Mr. Bain for years and are like family to him.

Authorities say the men were looking for a fugitive. But somehow, they ended up at the wrong house.

It was a quiet night in April, when Garth Myers and his fiancée Melissa Bauman were awakened by a loud crash at their home.

Lt. Tommy Wright with the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department says, “The couple was obviously very scared. They didn’t know what was going on. They report hearing a loud bang. They were immediately confronted by four men wielding handguns and a shotgun.”

But authorities say the armed intruders weren’t looking to rob their home. In fact, they weren’t looking for their home at all. Wright says, “Turns out some bondsmen were at the wrong house.”

They were bondsmen working for the AAA Bail Bonds Company. They were searching for someone who skipped bond, but apparently searching in the wrong place.

Now prosecutors have charged Steven Morgan, Thaddeus Bibb and Randall Avett. They’re facing counts of burglary, armed criminal action, felonious restraint, and property damage.

Lt. Wright says, “They had no legal right to enter that residence. They had no more right than you or I did to enter that residence. That’s why they were charged with what they were charged.”

It’s taken four months for charges to be filed. Morgan, Bibb and Avett all promptly posted bond courtesy of AAA Bail Bonds. The owner tells us he’s reserving judgment on his contract employees, until he knows all the facts.

Still authorities say bondsmen have to have legitimate grounds to enter a house. Lt. Wright says, “They’re held in the same standards as we are in the sense that they have to have the right information. They can’t just go around kicking in doors without doing the appropriate homework and knowing that the person they’re chasing is actually in there.”

In addition to the bondsmen, two other people are also facing charges in connection with the incident.

The victims in this case say they’ve filed a civil suit.

Now, so has something else: posting bond.

A sleek, ATM-style kiosk now greets arrivals in the concrete block lobby of the St. Lucie County jail, its animated touch screens beckoning arrivals who may debit or charge their bond - the price the accused pays to walk free before standing trial - to a Visa or MasterCard.

Since card processing debuted Aug. 1, 41 inmates have swiped $55,000 in bond payments.

While jail officials tout the new credit card option as a boon to taxpayers and inmates, those in the bail bond industry complain that the credit card system is an unfair and impotent competitor.

But it is faster.

The credit card system speeds the release of inmates who intend to post bond by hours, saving taxpayers some portion of the roughly $69 it costs to house an inmate for a day, jail officials say.

“The faster we can get them out of our house and in their own house, the better,” said Maj. F. Patrick Tighe, jail administrator for the St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office.

Charging also costs less: 3.2 percent with a minimum service charge of $2.50, vs. the 10 percent a bail bond company usually charges a customer upfront and then keeps after the accused has his day in court.

Profits from the fees cover the cost of the kiosk and processing equipment, which also allow visitors to deposit cash - for a $5 service fee - into inmate accounts used to buy toiletries and snacks from the jail commissary. The fees pay for jail services and amenities, such as the libraries, substance abuse program or classes to help inmates complete their education by earning a General Educational Development diploma.

“It’s not out of the taxpayers’ money,” Tighe said. “It’s out of these profits.”

But the bail bond industry has fought credit card bond processing in other states where the machines have appeared, including California and Indiana. Credit card processing cuts deeply into the essential moneymakers of what remains an industry of mom-and-pop businesses: bonds ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars, said Bill Kreins, spokesman for Professional Bail Agents of the United States, an industry association.

And unlike a credit card processor, a bond company has the tools and, more important, the incentive to hunt down those who skip bond, Kreins said. Kiosk users who flee face interest payments and a new warrant issued for their arrest.

Those who skip out on the bond face the bounty hunter.

“Sure, it cuts into business, but business is business and people can always open a store next to you,” said Kreins, who runs a surety company.

“There’s nobody who’s going to go out and arrest the defendant when he fails to appear. A bail bondsman basically rearrests at no cost to the taxpayers.”

A local bond agency said it was too early to tell whether the electronic system had affected the company. “A lot of people go out there with a money order or even pay cash to get someone out of jail,” said Janet Collins of Carroll Collins Bail Bonds.

Kreins said lawsuits to keep charge cards out of jails succeeded in California and failed in Indiana, arguing that the credit card processors amounted to unfair competitors that set prices and fee structures outside the regulatory eyes of state departments of insurance and banking, which typically oversee the bond industry. Kreins said a similar suit may be planned for Florida, where several other counties are considering allowing bond payments by credit card.

St. Lucie County is the first county to process bond payments through myfloridacounty.com. The Web site offers credit card payment options for other services - such as vehicle tag and driver license renewal - for 50 of Florida’s 67 counties.

In this edition of the Bail News Roundup, we found that new proposed legislation in Canada could affect bail and law enforcement officials working on this side of the border. This past week, the AboutBail.com staff was also debating a new idea for immigration laws - do you think that the Orlando Sentinel writer who proposes bonds for all immigrants is onto something? This week, the stories that got us thinking were:

http://www.aboutbail.com/news/round-up/bail-news-roundup-june302007.html

About AboutBail.com
Since 2001 AboutBail.com has been a resource for locating bail bond agents, criminal lawyers and bail recovery agents anywhere in the United States. The goal of AboutBail.com is to help our users and their loved ones in their time of need.

Need to get a loved one out of jail? Visit us online at http://www.aboutbail.com or call (866) 411-2245.

The AboutBail.com staff this week was reading about a bail enforcement professional committed to tracking down a dangerous felon. We were reading of a bail bondsman who had bad news to deliver and of changes (and possible changes) to legislation. If you are sick of the re-runs already, just check out our pick of the news this week:

http://www.aboutbail.com/news/round-up/bail-news-roundup-june222007.html

About AboutBail.com
Since 2001 AboutBail.com has been a resource for locating bail bond agents, criminal lawyers and bail recovery agents anywhere in the United States. The goal of AboutBail.com is to help our users and their loved ones in their time of need.

Need to get a loved one out of jail? Visit us online at http://www.aboutbail.com or call (866) 411-2245.

AboutBail.com
12335 Santa Monica Blvd. #300
Los Angeles, CA 90025
T - 866.411.BAIL (2245)
F - 888.824.2482
Contact AboutBail.com

This week, the AboutBail.com staff was reading about a suspicious fire that affected a bondsman and the tribulations of a self-described bounty hunter who was only recently released from Afghanistan. Add to that delays at the Fresno Jail and you have a week that challenged the profession. The one light of hope comes from proposed legislation that might restore more power to bail agents. Our top picks for this week’s news stories are:

http://www.aboutbail.com/news/round-up/bail-news-roundup-june152007.html

About AboutBail.com
Since 2001 AboutBail.com has been a resource for locating bail bond agents, criminal lawyers and bail recovery agents anywhere in the United States. The goal of AboutBail.com is to help our users and their loved ones in their time of need.

Need to get a loved one out of jail? Visit us online at http://www.aboutbail.com or call (866) 411-2245.

AboutBail.com
12335 Santa Monica Blvd. #300
Los Angeles, CA 90025
T - 866.411.BAIL (2245)
F - 888.824.2482
Contact AboutBail.com