Starr bail bondsmen want new sheriff to play by the rules
RIO GRANDE CITY -- Four Starr County bail bondsmen claim to have found 259 instances in which the Sheriff's Office did not follow the rules for accepting bonds on its prisoners.
The men sued in 2002 to stop then-sheriff Reymundo Guerra's practice of releasing inmates awaiting trial to family members or their lawyers, often with property promised in place of more formal cash bonds.
Although the bondsmen won an injunction in that case, the county has since dissolved its bail bonds oversight board and returned to its old ways, their attorney said Friday.
"Dissolving the bail bonds board was a way to get rid of our clients and just deal with the public directly," said attorney Orlando Jimenez. "They can say, ‘I can get your son out of jail, just don't forget about me, vote for me.'"
Jimenez and his clients, bail bondsmen Dave Jones, Octavio Castaneda, Daniel Villarreal and Mike Escovar, hope to convince a judge to reinstate the oversight board, thus forcing arrestees to go through certified bail bond companies or particular lawyers in order to bond out of the jail.
The current system, Jones said, "is just a slap in the JP's face." Justices of the Peace and magistrates impose a bond on those they believe to be flight risks, but the county is doing too little to ensure that the property being offered to stake the bond is of any value.
"The sheriff is just saying, have your mom sign here and you're good to go. There's no affidavit or proof that they're worth that kind of money," he said.
That hurts the bail bonds business. The prisoners currently being referred to bail companies are those without local family or friends, Jones said. Everyone else can go through the sheriff to bond them out. The undesirable clients are the most likely to run - and if they don't return, the bail bondsmen must forfeit the value of their bonds to the county.
The oversight board was dissolved in 2005 at the urging of District Attorney Heriberto Silva, who said that the more stringent rules for bonds imposed by the board were resulting in jail overcrowding and more people waiting in prison unnecessarily.
County officials argued at the time that many Starr County residents are land-rich but cash-poor and should be allowed to stake their land for the release of friends and relatives - even though many properties are protected from county confiscation by the state's homestead rules, which protect primary residences.
County Judge Eloy Vera, DA Silva and current Sheriff Rene Fuentes did not return calls for comment Friday. Jimenez promised that he would soon file suit against the county itself to ensure the reinstatement of the bonds board; a 2008 attorney general's opinion suggests that dissolving the board was illegal and would have required an act by the Texas Legislature.
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Sara Perkins covers Mission, western Hidalgo County, Starr County and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach her at (956) 683-4472.
