Prior record, offense level, key factors in setting bail

February 6, 2017 at 12:05a.m.

Prior record, offense level are key factors in ...

YOUNGSTOWN

You’ve been arrested and spend the night or weekend in jail waiting to be arraigned. Or, a friend or loved one has been.

You wonder if you can get bail and how it works. If so, you would not be alone.

Court officials say that the concept of bail is often misunderstood by the public. They say the purpose of bail is to make sure a criminal defendant appears in court for their case. Bail is not punishment, and it is unconstitutional to give someone a high bail for that purpose.

A high bail or no bail, however, can be given in some serious criminal cases – such as murder or aggravated-robbery or drug cases – if the defendant is determined to be a flight risk or a threat to the safety of the public, said municipal court Magistrate Anthony Sertick, who handles arraignments regularly at the court.

Sertick and Dan Dascenzo, a magistrate in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court, said several factors are taken into account when they are trying to determine bail for a defendant.

For Magistrate Sertick: He almost always is dealing with people who are making their initial court appearance, while Magistrate Dascenzo is mostly arraigning people who have cases from other courts that were bound over and indicted by a grand jury. There are several people, however, whose cases are directly presented to a grand jury and are thus making their first court appearance before him.

Magistrate Sertick said the first thing he looks at is how serious the charge is. Someone who is being arraigned for a first- or second-degree felony can probably expect to get a higher bail than someone who is being arraigned on a felony that is of a lower degree.

“The more serious the crime, the more the safety of the community as a whole comes into play,” Magistrate Sertick said.

Also important is the person’s prior criminal record, Magistrate Sertick said. He said someone with a prior record of committing the same offenses could be given a higher bail than someone who has none, although he also added he does not take a lot of stock in a history that is more than 10 years old. Also, if someone has a history of skipping court dates and a warrant is issued for them – that is called a capias – that will often result in a higher bail.

Dascenzo said an important factor for him in setting bail is a person’s ties to the community. He said someone who has a regular job and family here could see a lower bail than someone else because they have more to lose if they flee the jurisdiction.

“People who have those kinds of ties will be more likely to stay in the area,” Dascenzo said.

Dascenzo said he often defers to prosecutors when setting bail because they know the case better than he does, but not always.

Both magistrates also said someone’s income – or lack of income – makes no difference in setting bail.

But just because someone has a criminal history does not necessarily mean they will be stuck with a bail amount they cannot make. Magistrate Sertick said people who appear regularly before him at arraignment but also have a track record of showing up for their court dates will typically get a break when they are asking for bail, depending on the seriousness of the charge.

If someone is given a bail there are two kinds: 10 percent and cash or surety. A 10 percent bail is when someone is given a $5,000 bail or other amount but is only required to post 10 percent of that amount. That is typically reserved for someone who has a minimal criminal record. A cash or surety usually involves a bondsman, who takes 10 percent from the defendant then buys an insurance policy through the court guaranteeing the defendant’s appearance, said Jason “Chip” Chappell, vice president of All American Bail Bonds in downtown Youngstown.

Someone who posts a 10 percent bail will get the 10 percent back from the court if they do not miss any court dates.

If the defendant misses a court appearance, however, Chappell is then in danger of owing the insurance company the money put up to cover the bail. Often, Chappell said he has 30 days to find a defendant, and if he can find the defendant within 30 days, he does not have to pay the money back. If he cannot, then he owes the money.

If he finds the defendant after the 30 days, Chappell said some courts will allow him to recoup the money; others will allow him to recoup a portion of it, while others will not allow him to recoup anything.