The Bail Post

Tillmin Welch have been a bondsmen for over 30 years.  He is a past president of the Professional Bondsmen of Texas.  He is a former board member.  He has been honored as Bondsmen of The Year and has been awarded a honorary lifetime membership.  He is also the former long serving chair of the PBT Legislative Committee.  Join us as we discuss how PBT has navigated past legislative sessions.

Tillmin also discusses how he has helped families to get loved ones to change from their ways to get a way from drugs and gangs.  Even in retirement, Tillmin is active in prison ministries and continues to mentor to men in prison.

Randy Cauthen has a unique perspective on bail.  Randy worked in law enforcement for over 27 years.  After retiring, Randy was not ready to be idle.  So he began a second career in the bail industry.  He is the President of the North Carolina Bail Agents Association and was a 2019 inductee into the Hall of Fame for the bail agents association.  Join us as we learn about how bail operates in North Carolina and we compare it to how bail operates in Texas.

Season 2 is HERE!  This season begins much like the way that Season 1 began; a back to basics.  We start Season 2 by asking the question of "Why is the private surety system so effective?"  Throughout the United States the different release mechanisms used can be grouped into four categories:  the private surety bail system, cash bonds, personal bonds and preventative detention.  The private surety system has the lowest failure to appear rate by far of any the release mechanisms used.  Why is it so much more effective than any other release mechanism?  Join this episode of The Bail Post to learn more.

A Bail related case was argued before the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals on December 7, 2022.  The Indiana State Legislature passed a bill that placed restrictions on a charitable bail funds' ability to post bonds for defendants charged with crime of violence or charged with a felony and have a prior conviction for a crime of violence.  The bill passed the Indiana Legislature and was scheduled to go into effect July 1, 2022.  The Bail Project filed suit in federal court attempting to keep the new law from going into effect.  On this episode of the Bail Post, find out the arguments raised by the Bail Project against the statute.  Also, listen to a summary of the oral argument before the court of appeals. 

If you would like more information on this case, you can listen to the oral argument before the Seventh Circuit by CLICKING HERE.

To see the documents in the trial court or court of appeals- CLICK HERE.

Josh Tetens has been practicing law throughout Central Texas since 2006.   He originally came to Waco in 1997 to attend Baylor University where he graduated with a Bachelor's degree.  Following that, he went to Baylor Law School graduating in 2005.  

Josh applied for jobs as a prosecutor but was not able to find a position.  Therefore, he set up his own office and grew as a  criminal defense attorney.  

In the most recent campagin season, Josh Tetens was approached to run against the sitting District Attorney.  After a brusing campaign, Josh won the primary by 40 points.  Josh went on to win the general election on November 8th and will take office in January.  

On this espisode of The Bail Post we learn about Josh Tetens, his decisision to run for District Attorney, the campaign and the issues he sees facing him as he takes office.

SB 6 was a major bail reform bill passed in the last Texas Legislative Session.  As a part of the reforms, SB 6 enacted 17.027 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure which applies when a defendant is out on bond for a felony charge and is arrested again on a new felony charge in the same county.  Article 17.027 states that the defendant must be magistrated by the judge over his pending case.  The statute also says that the provision is not to be interpreted to change the timing requirements set out in article 15.17 (which requires magistration within 48 hours of arrest).  On today's episode, Guest Thomas R. Cox, III discusses how this provision is being implemented in Dallas County.  We also discuss other criminal justice reform issues on this episode of The Bail Post.

On this episode of our podcast, we discuss the impact of rising crime on economic development.  In areas across the country we are seeing the impact of bad bail reform policies where business are suffering or closing because of decriminalization policies.  Our guest is Eric Granof who has been a guest in the past.  Eric discusses a recent presentation he gave at annual meeting for PBT on this matter.  Eric is also working on paper on the subject.

Eric Granof is the Vice President, Corporate Communications Chief Marketing Officer – Expert Bail Network, AIA Surety.

Sean Kennedy is a writer and public policy expert focusing on crime, justice, and urban policy. His work has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, City Journal, CNN, and the Chicago Tribune, among others.

In August 2021, Mr. Kennedy wrote an article entitled, "Losing the Victory Over Crime" and he joins us to discuss his article.  This article was the original idea for a series of article that appear in the Quarterly Newsletters for PBT this year.

Join us as we address how our urban areas lost the victory over crime.

California has been the epicenter of the Criminal Justice Reform/Bail Reform movement.  Our guest is Bill Armstrong who is the President of the California Bail Agents Association.  California has seen several attempts to reform and get rid of the bail industry.  These changes can be traced back to when the State changed many felony offenses and made them misdemeanor offenses and then prosecutors in several urban areas decided that they would no longer prosecute these crimes.  This proposition and decisions of prosecutors started the slide of the state of California into chaos.  Now businesses are closing because either they cannot withstand wholesale shoplifting to the tune of $25,000.00 a day or the employers cannot provide a safe place for their employees to work.

Since then California's legislature has attempted to go even further.  But the votes has refused to go along.    California attempted to adopt the New Jersey Plan, but voters said no.  But the legislature's attempts to initiate bail reform has continued.

As we continue to shine a light on bail reform/criminal justice reform failures, it is becoming more and more clear that reform is not the goal, but decriminalization is.  Voters would never support it so reformers have sold it as "reform."

California is starting to see the light.  Help us spread the word to the rest of the country. 

Bill Armstrong is a third generation bondsman.  Bill's family has been continually writing bail in LA County for over 90 years dating back to Bill's grandfather.  

Have you ever heard of the expression that you cannot believe your "lying eyes?"  Its a way of saying don't believe what you see, believe what you are being told.  No where is this more evident than in Harris County regarding misdemeanor bail reform.  Reformers tell us over and over that the reforms are working and that we should not believe anyone else who says otherwise (even the Democrat District Attorney).

In this episode of The Bail Post, we evaluate whether the misdemeanor reforms are working looking at the failure to appear rates for each of the misdemeanor courts for the last two years.  The numbers are jaw dropping.  Additionally, we are releasing a website where any one  in the public can go and see the numbers for themselves.  There is no way to sugar coat this.  The numbers are not just bad; they are eye openingly bad.  They are so bad that our elected officials have to know and have to be intentionally hiding them. 

This probably explains why the bad results are spreading to the felony courts as well.

You can see the website by CLICKING HERE.

We are also releasing our first video version of this podcast where you can watch the podcast as well and just listen to the audio.  You can see it by CLICKING HERE.

After watching and/or listening to this episode, you will conclude that you can believe your "lying eyes."