Keep Bailing

Do Not Pass Go… Do Not Collect Two-Hundred Dollars

If for some unfortunate circumstance you are jailed in California and want to bail yourself out, you’ll need to pay 10% of whatever the bail amount is. For example, if your bail is set by the judge at $10,000, you’ll need to come up with $1,000 to pay a bail agent.  Even in this strapped economy, there are a lot of families who can get together and come up with that kind of money. Pretty basic, right?

As a caveat, if your bail amount was set  at $30 million dollars (as in the case of  one, Mr. Phillip Garrido), you would need to pay your friendly bail agent 10%, well… $3 million dollars.  Let’s just say that like the rest of America,  the Placerville  judge wasn’t taking too kindly to Mr. Garrido when he showed up for his day in court. Seems as the accused kidnapper and rapist of Jaycee Dugard, Mr. Garrido’s stiff bail amount would make it very difficult for him to get back onto the streets. A fit decision, I’d surmise. However, Garrido’s bail amount was far from being the highest ever set. And he isn’t alone when it comes to notorious people with multi-million dollar bails.

A Washington County judge set a bail at $6 million in 2006 for Steve Van Keuren, the man charged with killing his former girlfriend along with her boyfriend.

There was also the $10 million bail set in 1992 for Russell Lund, 59. The millionaire was charged with murdering his estranged wife and her boyfriend. Russell Lund committed suicide after the bail was posted.

There was an $11 million dollar bail amount set for a Brooklyn doctor who allegedly drugged and raped his female patients. When charged, he was upset that Justice Cassandra Mullen wouldn’t reduce his bail. She turned around and set it over 10 times higher.

A $20 million dollar bail amount was set for Drew Peterson. As you might remember, accused of murdering his wife in Joliet, Ill.

And the big Kahuna of all bail amounts set is $50 million for a man named Christian Karl Gerhartsreiter, AKA, Clark Rockefeller.  He allegedly kidnapped his own 7-year-old daughter.  Guess he didn’t have a cool $5 million laying around, so he asked for a bail reduction, which turned around on him.  The judge dismissed his option for bail all together.

… Although, there was once a judge in San Francisco who briefly set a prostitute’s bail at $5 billion dollars. (That’s billion with a “B“) But we’ll chock that up to bail folklore for now.

In California and other states, the law states that judges cannot deny defendants the basic right to a reasonable bail. Some can eschew this law by setting bail so high, the average Joe, along with their family members for several generations couldn’t ever afford to spring them out of jail. An interesting take on the bail system to say the least.

In a previous post, I wrote about some of the longest jail terms ever given out in the United States. Believe me, after reading some of the prison terms given, I’d opt for the big bail amount. At least I’d have plenty of time to save up.