Commercial Bail Bond System: Local Corruption and Ends vs. Rules

The most important division in ethics is between ends-based approaches (consequentialist or teleological, best known as "the ends justify the means") and rules-based approaches (deontological).

The most important problem for individuals in government is that we are taught rules-based approaches while we’re growing up (“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”), but in government most talk is in terms of ends (Will it raise taxes?).

Today’s New York <i>Times</i> has <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/29/us/29bail.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin">a long feature</a> about America’s commercial bail bond system. What is fascinating about the article from a municipal ethics point of view is that defenders of the system speak strictly in terms of ends.

<a href="http://www.cityethics.org/node/364">Click here to read the rest of this blog entry.</a>

Because of the commercial bail bond system, which is used in most states (but nowhere else in the world other than the Philippines), American defendants are more likely to show up for trial, are more likely to be captured if they flee, and the system costs the taxpayer nothing. “I’d rather see the money spent in parks, mental health issues, the homeless,” says a bail bondsman in the article. “Let the private sector do it. We do it better.”

So why doesn’t every country do it this way? Because defendants have to pay for the service even if they’re innocent (and the burden is greater on poor defendants). Because bail bondsmen determine who gets to use their services and who rots in jail (something the justice system is supposed to control, allowing some accountability). And because the system leads to corruption: bail bondsmen collude with justice officials to make sure bail is high and clients are sent their way.

A spokesman for Professional Bail Agents of the U.S. puts the choice well: "Life is not fair. ... But the system is the best in the world." The choice is, essentially, between better results in terms of fairness to those accused of crimes versus better results in terms of appearances in court (plus local government corruption and the perception that our justice system is not fair and that everyone’s in it for himself).

How much does this corruption cost? No price can be placed on it, so in our commercial bail bond states it is ignored. In nations where the argument “Let the private sector do it” is not controlling and where there are not wealthy vested interests, it is considered a very high price to pay.