I should call this “Bail
Agents: Insurance Lobbyists Are Not Your Friends, Part II,” as it illustrates
exactly what I wrote about last time.
In a recent blog, a bail
insurance company lobbyist wrote that by enacting SB 397, Pennsylvania
lawmakers somehow showed support for commercial bail. I don’t think so, and if
you read it, I don’t think that you’ll think so either. In fact, everything I
read indicates that Pennsylvania was trying to add regulations to the bail bond industry “by requiring that all
bail bondsmen play by the same rules,” according to the sponsor, Rep. Bryan
Cutler. Clamping down on an industry through additional regulations isn’t
really “backing” it.
So what did the legislation
do, and why do the insurance companies like it so much? Well, the biggest thing
it did was to require all bail agents to have insurance company backing – or, as
the lobbyist put it, “to be appointed by an approved surety insurer.” God
forbid there should be any bail agents in Pennsylvania without insurance
company backing, and so this bill fixed that. The whole thing is a pretty good
deal for the insurance companies, and it might be a good deal for bail agents
and the people of Pennsylvania except for one thing: having an insurance
company back a bail bond doesn’t do anything for anyone because the insurance
companies never pay any losses.
They even admit to this. In
fact, the bail insurance companies are so confident about their place in the
system that one lobbyist recently bragged to a reporter for Mother Jones that
the lobbyist’s company had been in business for 107 years and never once –
NEVER ONCE – paid a single forfeiture. So bail agents are required to have
insurance company backing, but is there really any backing if they never pay?
It’s free money for the insurance companies, which is why they’re fighting so
hard to keep it rolling in.
So, then, if insurance
companies don’t pay, who does? Well, defendants, defendants’ families, and bail
agents pay, that’s who. If you’re a bail agent, you already know that, just
like you know about buildup funds. In the surety bail system we have today, bail
agents do everything, they’re on the hook, and they’re expected to drop bags of
money on the steps of the insurance companies or face the consequences. If it
looks a bit like the Godfather Part IV, it is. Deep down, bail agents know that
they don’t need any help from insurance companies, no matter what those
companies tell the state legislatures.
So don’t let these lobbyists
tell you that SB 397 did anything good for bail agents, and for goodness sake,
don’t let them tell you that the whole thing showed that Pennsylvania “backs”
commercial bail. This is the twisted world of the bail insurance companies,
which help lawmakers put restrictions on bail agents designed to make the
insurance companies money, and then try to sell it to bail agents at the
various conventions. Your honor, I refer to the case of lipstick versus pig.
