Bailing out on your credit card

Posted on September 2, 2007
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These days you can use your credit card to buy everything from gas to groceries. So, why not use it to bail out of jail?

“I see this as a way of business,” said Major Pat Tighe of the St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office. “Every gas station, every retail cash business has the debit card, credit card. We’re just bringing the St. Lucie County jail up to standards that the community expects.”

The St. Lucie County Sheriff’s Office started the program this month.

Any inmate or member of their family can present a credit card to the jail to post bond on the spot.

“They’ve been mostly DUI, driving under a suspended license,” said Lt. Dan O’Brien who presides over the jail’s inmate booking system, “We have had some felonies like $5,000.”

Deputies say the system cuts down on paperwork, that it’s faster and more efficient them, the inmate, and the taxpayers who keep the jail running.

“It costs $69 a day to house an inmate,” said Major Tighe, “The quicker we can process the inmate through and get them back in their house rather than the jail it’s going to save money.”

But the swipe-and-go system does have its critics.

“Well, as a bail bondsman I don’t like it,” said Dennis Schultz of A-Liberty Bail Bonds, “It’s cutting into my business, first of all.”

Bail bondsmen, who typically charge inmates 10% of what they loan, worry the credit card companies’ smaller 3.2% fee will put them out of business.

But they say citizens should have their worries, too. If an inmate skips out on bail and doesn’t show up to court, deputies will simply issue a warrant for their arrest. St. Lucie County has a backlog of 9,000 unserved arrest warrants.

“They cannot possibly hunt down everybody,” said Shultz, arguing for the efficiency of the existing bond system. “We have to hunt them down or we’re going to lose our money. To get our money back we have to catch them and get them back in there.”

Sheriff’s officials say most of the inmates using the credit card system are in for petty crimes and minor bail amounts that bail bondsmen ordinarily wouldn’t handle.

Although for someone with good credit, a card could be used to pay a bond of any amount.

So far this month 42 inmates have taken advantage of the new system, paying out nearly $50,000 in bonds with their credit cards.

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