If you have been apprehended for a crime in Bell, CA, what you want the least is to spend time behind bars while contesting the charges labeled against you. The best way you can prepare for the trial is to spend time with your loved ones and perform your daily activities.
Luckily, the legal system works in a manner that you are presumed innocent until proven otherwise. Therefore, you can secure a pretrial release when granted bail, pending trial. At Cali Bail Bonds, we are here to help if you need bail services to ensure your freedom and return to your regular life as you show up in court for hearings.
When an arrest warrant is issued against you over crime suspicions, the law enforcement will make an arrest and detain you in jail or police custody. Before being presented in court for the bail proceedings or arraignment, you will undergo the booking process, which includes the following steps:
While you wait to be presented before a judge, you will be placed in a holding cell that accommodates all kinds of defendants, including felons. Unfortunately, this makes these police cells dangerous places to be held.
When you commit a crime, and the court issues an arrest warrant, you may be tempted to surrender to the authorities if you’ve been escaping their traps for long. Although this seems the right step to take under the circumstances, you might want to rethink the idea.
Instead of surrendering, contact your Bell bail bonds and discuss your options. These bondsmen will evaluate your case and determine if you qualify for bail bonds. If options are available to explore, they will discuss the rates and pretrial release conditions.
Having discussed all the details of the bail process, you can then surrender to law enforcement. You will undergo the usual booking process while the bail agency formalizes your bailing information to secure release pending or awaiting trial.
Informally, bail is a way in which the court guarantees that you, the accused, will be present in all your court hearings by requiring you to deposit a particular amount of money in exchange for a pretrial release. If you do not attend your trial, the assets or bail money deposited is forfeited. The money you deposit as bail can be set using the bail schedule in a bail proceeding, which is often a short process.
A bail schedule is a list containing bail money applying to various criminal charges. The bail schedule provides the money you should post for a crime or determines whether bail should be granted or denied. In the bail hearing, the judge can increase or decrease this amount if they deem it necessary.
The judge handling your bail hearing evaluates several aspects before deciding to grant or deny bail. During bail proceedings, the most common considerations are whether you are a flight risk or pose any danger to the public. These and other factors are further discussed below:
Depending on the facts in your case, the judge may view you as a threat to the public, reducing the chances of a pretrial release on bail. For example, the court will consider you a danger to the public if you had made threats to an individual before your arrest and the individual presents a valid statement before the court to show the risk you pose to them and their immediate family. Besides, the judge considers factors like the type of offense you are charged with if there is sufficient evidence to earn a conviction and your criminal history.
Before granting bail, a judge must examine the possibility of you returning to court for the trial proceedings. First, they will begin by checking your court appearances record to determine whether you have a history of skipping court. In the event it is apparent you deceived the judges in previous cases to grant bail but later skipped it, you won’t be given one in the present case. Additionally, if you don't have strong community ties or have good relations within your community, the possibility of the court granting bail is slim.
However, if you relate well with the community before the arrest and the judge is persuaded you won’t be skipping court, they will grant bail.
Chances are high; you will be denied bail if the evidence is solid enough for a conviction, and the penalties you face subject to a conviction are harsh and life-changing. If you face a life sentence upon conviction, however high the bail amount is set, you will likely flee the state than someone whose conviction will result in minor penalties. Furthermore, if you can post the big bail money, it is an indicator to the court that you can flee California and evade arrest, thus being denied bail.
The court knows that you can use proceeds of crime to post bail. Therefore, they allow the prosecuting team to challenge the source of your bail money if there is reason to believe it was acquired illegally. They do this through a court proceeding where you, as the accused, bear the burden of proving the source of your money is legitimate. Before the hearing happens, you will remain in jail until when it is determined, after the proceeding, to grant or deny bail.
If the judge is persuaded that you used crime proceeds to post bail, they will deny bail, and you must remain in jail until the case is concluded.
As the accused, you have manifold ways to post the bail money. These are:
The most prevalent way of posting bail is through Bell bail bonds, although you or your immediate family or friends must make a financial commitment.
California issues bail bonds agencies or companies with licenses to offer bail services as mediators between you, the defendant, and the court. These companies charge a premium rate of 10% of the sum of the bail money in exchange for them posting the remaining amount with the court to secure a release pending trial. You are encouraged to work with an attorney during your bail hearing because if the court grants it and you can’t raise the amount, the bail services you seek will offer you a 2% discount, which helps save money.
However, at times you might not have the opportunity to reach out to the bail bondsmen in person. In these cases, your family members or friends are the ones to contact your Bell bail agency. These family members will be required to provide the following details to the court to accelerate the process:
If your family can provide this information, they can speed up your release because the bail agent handling your case will waste time finding this information, thus extending your jail stay.
And because your Bell bail agency pays the remaining bail money after paying the premium of 8-10%, they assume an obligation to ensure you show up in court.
If you have been accused of an infraction or any low-level crime or the court deems you of no flight risk, you may obtain an O.R. release, although based on the judge’s volition. Here, the court furnishes you with a citation that you sign promising to appear for hearings on the scheduled dates.
It’s worth noting that an O.R. release doesn’t come easily. First, you must convince the judge of it, and the best way to do this is to hire a bail attorney to provide legal representation at the bail proceeding. When ruling on this issue, the court considers your tendency of skipping court dates and whether there are felony arrest warrants out there against you. Nevertheless, the court will grant an O.R. release if your attorney convinces the court that you are not a danger to the general public or promises that you’ll be present in all your case hearings.
When you, the defendant, decides not to appear for the court date, you will face serious repercussions. Remember, your Bell bail bonds agency assumes the responsibility of ensuring you don’t skip court once you obtain a pretrial release. Therefore, when you become a no-show in court, the agency or bondsmen are given a grace period to find you and bring you back to court. Otherwise, the court will forfeit the bail money or assets you had deposited.
First, the court issues a failure to appear bench warrant, allowing your Bell bail bonds agency to send a bounty hunter after you. When you receive the bench warrant, it is an indication that the cash or bond you had deposited with the court has been forfeited.
Again, your Bell bail agency requires you to provide collateral or incentive on the bail money in the form of a deed on real property or vehicle. That way, if you skip bail, they will seize the property or assets and auction them to recover the bail money forfeited after you missed court.
However, not everyone who skips court is escaping justice. You might have a persuasive reason for not showing up in court, like a severe illness or injury confining you in a hospital bed or a mental illness that hinders you from comprehending the charges against you. So, the court will be persuaded if you skipped bail because you are admitted to a psych ward.
Similarly, if you were detained by a different law enforcement authority or in another jurisdiction, you can claim that you had a legitimate reason for skipping court. The claims can only be compelling if you have valid paperwork to support them.
Bell City Jail
6326 Pine Avenue
Bell, California. 90201
Phone: 323-267-4800
Downey Courthouse
7500 East Imperial Highway
Downey, CA, 90242
Phone: +1 562-803-7050
Bail bonds offer many benefits to arrestees in Bell, CA. Unfortunately, not all agencies providing these services out there are equal, so you need to focus more on finding the right bail agency to simplify the entire process. At Cali Bail Bonds, we will do everything in our capacity to ensure you enjoy all the benefits of this procedure. Call us today at 562-376-5476 to be released from the holding cell.
