Olympia Criminal Defense Attorneys

Higher bails likely in courts despite deadlock in Olympia

An effort to tighten up the state's largely unregulated bail-bond industry quietly died in the waning days of the legislative session because of an ideological dispute between law enforcement and advocates for the poor.

The bail legislation, addressing one of the largest public-policy issues to arise from the 2009 slayings of four Lakewood police officers, would have for the first time set mandatory minimums for what defendants must pay to post bail bonds.

As a result of failed negotiations, bail amounts across the state are likely to rise as judges and prosecutors are left to guess how much defendants are paying to be released from jail before trial. After the murders of the four officers in a Lakewood coffee shop, The Seattle Times found that shooter Maurice Clemmons had posted just 4 percent of his $190,000 bail to win his release six days before the attack.

That revelation surprised prosecutors and judges, who had widely assumed a defendant must pay a 10 percent premium to a bail-bonding agency for the agency to post a bond.

But an effort late in the 2011 legislative session to set a floor for bailing bonds — even at 5 percent of the bail amount — was killed after Sen. Adam Kline, D-Seattle, opposed it.

Kline, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the late proposal, floated by the state's prosecuting attorneys, would have been unfair to poor defendants, who have benefited from competition among bail-bonding agencies.

"I don't want wealthy people getting out while poor people don't get out for lack of money," said Kline, who represents Seattle's Rainier Valley. "We rejected the idea of debtor's prison early in this game in this country, and that's a sort of debtor's prison."

Tom McBride, executive director of the Washington Association of Prosecuting Attorneys, said prosecutors wanted a floor so they — and the public — would know how much "skin in the game" a defendant had. When it became clear Kline opposed the idea, McBride's group agreed to let the bill die and negotiate further after the session.

"Our goal is not to make it so you can't make bail. We just want to know what bail means," he said.

Bail bonds are akin to an insurance policy, allowing a defendant to be released from jail in exchange for a promise to show up for the next court hearing. If a defendant flees, the bondsman must post the entire bail amount if unable to find the absconder.

Jury begins deliberating Ariz. sweat lodge case - Entertainment ...

Prosecutor Sheila Polk wrapped up her rebuttal arguments before the case was handed off to the jury.

Jurors are considering whether James Arthur Ray was aware of, and consciously disregarded, a substantial and unjustifiable risk of death in the October 2009 ceremony near Sedona.

A conviction on all three manslaughter counts could send Ray to prison for more than 37 years. A lesser charge of negligent homicide would cut the maximum sentence to about 11 years. Ray would be eligible for probation under both charges.

The trial began more than three months ago and has included hundreds of exhibits and countless hours of testimony. Prosecutors called about three dozen witnesses, and the defense had two people testify to support its argument that toxins possibly contributed to the deaths of Liz Neuman, 49, of Prior Lake, Minn.; James Shore, 40, of Milwaukee; and Kirby Brown, 38, of Westtown, N.Y.

Ray's attorneys contend authorities botched the investigation into the sweat lodge and then improperly charged Ray with what amounted to a tragic accident.

Defense attorney Luis Li told jurors in closing arguments last week that prosecutors failed to follow up on mentions of toxins or poisons, and stressed that the medical examiners who performed the autopsies couldn't rule out organophosphates, a chemical typically found in pesticides.

"The state has robbed each and every one of you of the truth, of the ability to determine what the actual truth was, whether by inadvertence, whether because they just didn't feel like looking at it, whatever it was," Li told jurors.

The medical examiners who performed autopsies on the victims stuck to their conclusions that heat caused the deaths.

More than 50 people participated in the sweat lodge ceremony that was meant to be the highlight of Ray's "Spiritual Warrior" event.

Sweat lodges are commonly used by American Indian tribes to cleanse the body. The ceremony involves heating stones outside the lodge and then placing them in a pit inside the lodge. The door is closed, and water is poured on the stones, producing heat aimed at releasing toxins from the body.

Polk said Ray did nothing when some participants at the ceremony were having trouble breathing, vomiting and being dragged out in front of him. He ignored pleas for help and instead introduced more heated rocks and steam into the structure, she said.

"Are those the actions of a reasonable person in that situation, or are those the actions of a man who is criminally reckless?" Polk asked the jury Tuesday. "Death was not inevitable, and this was no accident.

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