Bail Frequently Asked Questions
The Court concluded that there was no affordable justification for not allowing the surety more time to recuperate the defendant and ordered that the case be remanded and the surety’s motion granted. The defendant failed to appear on July 9, however her counsel stated she was in custody and the authorities had not transported her to court. When she failed to appear on the fifteenth, the court forfeited the bond and issued a warrant. After several extensions, a well timed summary judgment was entered in opposition to the surety. On attraction, the courtroom rejected the surety’s argument that the court docket misplaced jurisdiction to declare a forfeiture when it didn’t forfeit the bond on July 9.
Rptr.3d 686 (Cal. App. 2005) held that summary judgment against the surety was premature because a well timed motion to extend the looks period was pending at the time the summary judgment was entered. The Court nevertheless affirmed the judgment as a result of the surety did not make a timely motion to set it apart or take an enchantment from the judgment. Instead, the surety waited until after the attraction period expired after which filed a movement to vacate the judgment on the idea that the trial court docket did not have jurisdiction to grant it. During trial, one surety surrendered the defendant and Harco provided a new bond. The defendant immediately absconded, and the courtroom forfeited the bond.
The Court of Appeals held that the prolonged forfeiture period had expired, the trial courtroom not had jurisdiction to set aside the forfeiture, and in any case, the mistaken exoneration of the opposite bond was not a foundation to grant reduction from forfeiture of Bankers’ bond. In People v. Gutierrez, 2003 WL (Cal. App. November 24, 2003) the bond was for $215,000 and the premium was $21,500. The defendant’s mother paid $2,one hundred and pledged her house as security for the bond.
The trial courtroom had reason to imagine the defendant had a sufficient excuse (the representation by her counsel) and was not obligated to verify that she was really in custody. The issue just isn’t whether she had a enough excuse but whether or not the trail court docket had cause to consider she had a sufficient excuse. The courtroom additionally rejected the surety’s argument that the defendant didn’t have discover of the July 15 listening to since no notice was required. Since the trial court didn’t comply with the statutory requirement, the bond was not forfeited when the defendant failed to appear and is exonerated by operation of law. Thus, the trial courtroom lost jurisdiction over the bond and its subsequent abstract judgment was void.
The Court of Appeals noted that Penal Code §1305 does not require a notice to give the date of forfeiture, only that or not it’s mailed inside 30 days of forfeiture, and held that the discrepancy in the dates was a clerical error, which might be corrected at any time. The defendant failed to appear on the charge for which Bankers was surety on the bond, and the agent requested an extension of the one hundred eighty day period to produce the defendant and exonerate the bond. During the continued period, the agent obtained a replica of the opposite bond marked exonerated by the court docket clerk. The agent assumed that meant the defendant had been apprehended and took no additional motion on the Bankers bond.
Rptr.3d 511 (Cal.App. 2006) held that Penal Code §1305(c) does not require the Court on its own movement to vacate the forfeiture if the defendant is incarcerated in one other county within a hundred and eighty days of the forfeiture, and doesn’t mechanically exonerate the bond. On the other hand, the Court additionally held that there isn’t any time restrict for the surety to make a movement to vacate the forfeiture underneath such circumstances. The surety submitted affidavits from its investigators describing their intensive efforts to find the defendant and the information that they had obtained. They discovered an tackle for him and spoke with the indemnitor on the bond, who agreed to assist find him. They didn’t guarantee that he would be recovered if the interval was extended, however they said that they believed he could be situated.
Notice of forfeiture was timely mailed, but the notice referred to the incorrect date of forfeiture. The surety argued that the court docket misplaced jurisdiction to enter judgment on the bond because no notice had been given of the particular forfeiture.