• Complete a 40-hour “power of arrest” course certified by the California Bureau of Security and Investigative Services commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST).
• Complete a “power of arrest” course certified by the Bureau of Security and Investigative Services.
• Complete a 12 hour of education relating to the duties and responsibilities of a Bail Licensee certified by the Department of Insurance.

All of these requirements can be found here. Okay, so that’s the legal requirements which are fairly easy to complete since no testing is required. Now let’s list the physical and mental requirements. If you’re okay with the following then you should have no problem doing the job.

• Can you sit in your car for 10, 12 or 18 hours staring at a house?
• Are you okay with peeing in a big gulp cup in your car?
• Are okay with eating 2 day old fast food?
• Are you okay with being spit on, punched, kicked, screamed at, pepper sprayed or tasered?
• Do you like to fight?
• Are you comfortable touching homeless people or searching homeless encampments (which may include walking through human feces)?
• Are you okay with someone pointing a loaded gun at you? This includes cops, criminals and parents or friends of criminals.
• Are you okay with being awaken at 3 in the morning by annoying phone calls from informants, defendants or parents / friends of defendants?

If you said no to any of the above questions then this job is probably not for you. However, if you said yes to the above then you may want to seek mental help.

We waited for her for what seemed like 3 hours. The senior investigator seemed to be irritated with all my the questions. I was acting like child on the way to my first day of kindergarten but I didn’t care, I was nervous. He was giving me instructions about how to effect the arrest and bunch of other irrelevant information, none of which I was have retained. He may have been my senior but looking back he was the most unorganized and unprofessional investigator I have ever worked. He has since, uh, resigned from the company.

About an hour later he spots the girl and signals to me, “let’s go”. She was a very large girl, around 250 pounds and about 6 feet tall. It’s a chick I thought, what could she possible do to us. We walked across the street and told her who we were. “You’re under arrest”, he says. I had no idea what to do so I stood there like an idiot and waited for something to happen. Well something did happen. She immediately starts backing away from us and tries to turn and run. The other investigator and I attempted to grab her to get handcuffs on but she was having nothing to do with it. We struggled around a bit until she fell on the hood of a car, caving it in. Oh shit, this is not good. This bitch is going to kick our asses.

We’re struggling for a few seconds when I notice that her loose tank top had been pulled down to her waist and her breasts were exposed. It was not pretty mind you, she had more hair on her chest then me. I was thoroughly disgusted. So she starts screaming “Rape!, Rape!, their trying to rape me”. Oh great, not only am I getting my ass kicked by a girl but now I’m going to jail for attempted rape. I hate this job already. I look across the street and I see 2 San Francisco Police Officers running towards us. When they get about 10 feet from us they ask me if we need any help. Uh? I just causally respond no thanks, we got it. They turn and walk away as though they didn’t see anything. Ok, back to the fight. This girl is doing everything she can to get free. She yelling “my baby, my baby”, as though she was pregnant and we keep yelling at her to stop resisting. Finally we get her hands cuffed. What a relief! We start walking her to the car when she realizes that she was really going to jail. Here we go again. She starts kicking and thrashing about trying to head butt us. The other investigator starts yelling at me to get the leg irons from the trunk. Leg irons are just like handcuffs but are used on the ankles instead of the wrists.

I run to the trunk and am surprised to find nothing but disarray and filth in it. “Where are they?” I ask. “On the side, on the side!” he yells. I can’t find shit in his trunk, you think he would have been a little more prepared and organized. I have since learned the importance of knowing exactly where you gear is at all times. You just never know when you’re going to need something so you had better know where it is. This is actually getting funny now. I can’t find the leg irons so he tells me to hold her while he gets them. He returns and cuffs her ankles together but she is not calming down at all. I was still totally confused about how to handle this. Looking back though,  there were several other ways this could have been handled and probably with a much more peaceful result.

We are now trying to get her into the car and she is still screaming. There is now a crowd of people watching us. I’m starting to get a bit embarrassed and just want this to be overwith. I want to get her out of here. She is finally coaxed into the car but is still not giving up. She’s kicking at the windshield and spitting on the dash. Let’s go, I tell the other guy. Let’s get out of here. We finally get her across the street to the county jail and get her in a holding cell. Have you ever seen someone slam their head so hard against a wall that it bleeds? Well that’s what she was doing. It was pathetic and funny all at the same time. By the end of they day I was seriously thinking that I had chosen the wrong profession. Looking back I realized that this was not the norm and if you treat each arrest differently and every person with respect you might not have to fight them. The other investigator was an idiot and loved to bully people into an arrest. I still see him on occassion and am wondering when someone is going to teach him a lesson.

The definitions below were taken directly from Santa Clara County’s website:

ORP
ORP stands for “Own Recognizance Release Program.” Defendants who are granted an Own Recognizance Release are required to make all scheduled court appearances and to not violate any laws.

SORP
SORP stands for “Supervised Own Recognizance Release Program.” Defendants who are granted a Supervised Own Recognizance Release have been granted a release that is based upon the defendant’s agreement to abide by specific conditions set by the Court. Examples of conditions that might be imposed are; drug treatment and drug testing; psychological counseling; “no contact” orders; domestic violence counseling; and frequent reporting to the Office of Pretrial Services.

There are two factors that need to be considered here. First, when a jail O.R’s a criminal and he fails to appear in court the only agency who cares about this is the agency who gets the warrant for the criminal’s arrest. This may be the original agency that arrested the criminal or the local Sheriff’s office. I can tell you from experience that when a department gets a bench warrant they may visit the criminal’s house once – this is called “due diligence”. I can also tell you that, rarely, will they spend any time hunting for the criminal as they have no financial interest in getting this guy back to court.

On the other hand, if the criminal is bailed out by a bail company, regardless of how he paid for the premium, the bail company has to get him back to court or risk paying off the bond. So, on a $10,000 bond, the criminal is required to pay a 10% premium or $1,000. If they fail to appear in court the bail company is required to pay $10,000 to the court or return the criminal back to jail. This is why bail companies hire bounty hunters; bounty hunters save the bail companies money.

There is an obvious advantage to society to force criminals to use bail companies and NOT an OR program. The writer for the Associated Press should have done a bit more homework on the bail system before writing this article. For the record, I’m not a fan of bail-credit but also I’m less a fan of the OR system.

The Associated Press: Bail bondsmen make it cheaper to get out of jail.

There are not too many choices for parking so we’re closer to the house than we would like. There are lots of people in the neighborhood and an old man paces back and forth in front of the house. You can tell he is trying to figure us out.

The neighbors pull up, I think I’ll ask them if they know the fugitive. Nope, they’ve never seen him. Not sure I believe them because she just looked at the photo and immediately said no. It’s also an indication they may be lying when they don’t ask you who he is or what he did. Most people will ask, most people are nosy and want the details. I would ask.

We decide to make contact at the house and see what they say. Knock, knock… Your adrenaline always gets going a bit when you knock on someone’s door. You never know who’s going to answer or what’s going to happen when the door opens. Is the fugitive just going to run out and start fighting, do they have a gun, how many people are inside and the bigger question – do they have big dogs? You always have to be planning for the worst. You have to be watching all around you.

It’s also difficult when there’s only two people, someone has to watch the side yard in case the fugitive decides to jump the fence and someone has to be at the door when they answer. So I watch the side yard and try to peek though the fence until someone answers the door. Dogs are barking and it smells like sewage. I am trying to watch both the yard and my partner. It’s tricky.

The large Hispanic woman opens the door and I can hear my partner ask for the fugitive. She tell us that she is the his sister and has not seen him in 9 months. 2 small children are also standing at the door. My partner asks if we can search the house. She refuses. Sometimes this is an indication that the fugitive is in the house. However, after talking with her we decide that she’s telling the truth. I want to search. I love searching houses. I love finding people hiding under beds or in closets. Most people are not that creative when it comes to hiding.

On to Dad’s house in South San Jose. This is a nicer neighborhood and were not too concerned about being discreet. Again, we make contact at the front door and talk to yet another sister who confirms the other sister’s story about him disappearing 9 months ago. I get the feeling that none of his siblings likes him too much. He sounds like a dirt bag. He thinks he’s a gang banger and pedal dope.

I always get disappointed when we hit a wall. There’s nothing more exciting then getting a solid lead and you know your close. After all we do this because we like hunting people. We like outsmarting people who think they can hide forever. I love the surprised look on their face when you tell them their under arrest. Were done with this case for the day.

There are a couple of people that I really want to get myself and I’m looking forward to arresting them. One of them, let’s call him EZ, molested his 6 year old niece. I have to be careful not to go into too much detail but this guy is a piece of garbage. He was baby sitting his niece and his daughter and decided, after a few beers, to put his hands on her.

During the police investigation it was determined that this was not the first time he’s done this. The last time was with his own 7 year old daughter. Since then his first wife dumped him and, get this, warned his current wife. She either didn’t believe it or doesn’t care. I have spoken to her and she’s living in denial.

Anyway, he decided not to go to court and I’ve been looking for him for about 3 months. Some of his family members are helping but I’m concerned he may have fled back to Mexico. This is more common then most people think – Mexicans coming here illegally (or otherwise), committing crime and then fleeing back to Mexico. More on that later.

I’ve taken a special interest in capturing EZ and it’s a high bond amount so I am spending more time developing and following leads. I have some pretty good information that he is running with a friend and might still be in the area. I am working with the police detective that worked the case and have a good relationship with one of his family members. She trusts me and is convinced that he needs to be in jail.

As always, everyone’s innocent until proven guilty…