Bail Enforcement Agents (Department of Insurance)
| Submitted | April 21, 2017 |
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Communications
From: Curtis Waltman
To Whom It May Concern:
Pursuant to the South Carolina Freedom of Information Act, I hereby request the following records:
Records relating to bail enforcement Agents also known as BEA's, Bounty Hunters, bail agents, bail recovery agents, bail recovery agents, skip tracers, or fugitive recovery agents. An itemized list of the records I am requesting about BEA's follows:
-Any training material including syllabi, power point presentations, or any distributed reading material. Please conduct this portion of the search from 1/1/05 to the date this request was processed on.
-Any regulations, policies, guidelines, or any other rules made to limit or manage what a BEA can and cannot do.
-Use of force policies for BEA's.
-All complaints against any BEA licensed or permitted by this agency with the following date range: 1/1/05 to the date this request is processed on.
-Financial documentation concerning the gross income of the Bail Enforcement industry in the state. In addition or in the event the agency does not keep documentation about the overall finances going to Bail Enforcement, any documentation about billing, salary/payment range, or potential benefits are also requested.
-Number of injuries and fatalities reported per year from the Bail Enforcement industry.
The requested documents will be made available to the general public, and this request is not being made for commercial purposes.
In the event that there are fees, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.
Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 15 business days, as the statute requires.
Sincerely,
Curtis Waltman
From: Steven DuBois
Mr. Waltman, your FOIA request was received in this office on April 21, 2017 and forwarded to me for a response. Unfortunately, most of the information you have requested is not gathered, nor maintained, by this Department. Here is the link to the Chapter 53 of the SC Code of Laws that governs Bail Bondsmen in this state: http://www.scstatehouse.gov/code/t38c053.php The only other information we would have available would be for complaints. We cannot differentiate the bail bondsmen from the insurers that were involved in bail issues through a query of the database, that would be have to be done manually. A cursory review shows an approximate total of 600+ complaints. The fee for this service is 25 cents a page, 8% tax, postage and $30 an hour for labor. The postage fee would be eliminated of course due to you wanting the documents via email. The labor fee would be extensive as these types of files require a lot of redaction which is time consuming. I cannot give you a total cost as there is no way to estimate the number of pages or time involved, but it will be very expensive. I will begin processing your request once I receive your acknowledgment of the fees.
Steven R. Du Bois, PIR
Administrative Coordinator
Office of Legal, Legislative and External Affairs
South Carolina Department of Insurance
803-737-6200
From: Steven DuBois
Mr. Waltman, the below response to your FOIA request was sent on Apr 26, 2017 and to date we have not received a response. If no response is received by May 24, 2017 we will close this request without action.
Steven R. Du Bois, PIR
Administrative Coordinator
Office of Legal, Legislative and External Affairs
South Carolina Department of Insurance
803-737-6200
From: Curtis Waltman
Mr. Du Bois,
I am interested in reducing the cost of this request. I am willing to reduce the time limit down to 1/1/12. Could you see how much that might bring the cost down? I recognize 12 years is a very long time. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Curtis Waltman
From: Steven DuBois
Mr. Waltman, the change in date to 1/1/12 reduces the amount of possible files that are responsive to your request down to approximately 344, still a large number. In processing that amount of files, the labor alone would be in the hundreds of dollars. Perhaps if you could limit the type of complaint you are interested in? Mostly, these complaints are for failure to remit premiums to insurers, failing to file bond reports, etc.
Steven R. Du Bois, PIR
Administrative Coordinator
Office of Legal, Legislative and External Affairs
South Carolina Department of Insurance
803-737-6200
-
~WRD000
From: Curtis Waltman
Hi Mr. Du Bois,
I am mostly interested in complaints dealing with misconduct by BEA's against a bail jumper i.e. improper use of force, abusive behavior or language, that kind of thing. Failing to file bond reports and failure to remit premiums are not what I am looking for. Would that bring the cost down further? If need be I can further limit the time range to say 1/1/14. Please advise, thank you!
Sincerely,
Curtis Waltman
From: MuckRock.com
To Whom It May Concern:
I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information request, copied below, and originally submitted on April 21, 2017. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response, or if further clarification is needed.
Thanks for your help, and let me know if further clarification is needed.
From: Steven DuBois
Mr. Waltman, I apologize for the delay in response but have been out of the office. At any rate, the SC Department of Insurance does not normally handle the types of complaints you are referring to as we are an administrative agency. Generally, the complaints you are referring to would be handled by law enforcement. There is one case on a Curtis Maroney that may be responsive to your request. It was a file from 2010 containing approximately 150 pages. I have attached the Revocation Order that provides some detail. Please let me know if this is something you would be interested in.
Steven R. Du Bois, PIR
Administrative Coordinator
Office of Legal, Legislative and External Affairs
South Carolina Department of Insurance
803-737-6200
-
~WRD000
From: Curtis Waltman
Hi Mr. Du Bois,
No worries, I understand. Yes, I would be very interested in that. If you could send that file over at some point I would be very appreciative. Thank you!
Sincerely,
Curtis Waltman
From: Steven DuBois
Mr. Waltman, attached are the invoice for your FOIA request along with a redacted copy of the file you requested. Every effort has been made to protect personally identifiable information, but in the event something was missed, please give it all due protection. There are 153 pages in the file. I have only charged for 130 to allow for duplicates. Payment is due upon receipt. Please contact me should you require anything further.
Steven R. Du Bois, PIR
Administrative Coordinator
Office of Legal, Legislative and External Affairs
South Carolina Department of Insurance
803-737-6200
From: MuckRock
To Whom It May Concern:
Please find enclosed a check for $50.10 to fulfill my public records request. Thank you!
Sincerely,
Curtis Waltman
From: MuckRock.com
To Whom It May Concern:
I wanted to follow up on the following Freedom of Information request, copied below, and originally submitted on April 21, 2017. Please let me know when I can expect to receive a response, or if further clarification is needed.
Thanks for your help, and let me know if further clarification is needed.
From: Steven DuBois
You have already received your response, and paid for it. See messages below indicating where invoice and a copy of the file were attached.
Steven R. Du Bois, PIR
Administrative Coordinator
Office of Legal, Legislative and External Affairs
South Carolina Department of Insurance
803-737-6200
-
~WRD000
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