When bail must be paid, many defendants recruit the services of a bail agent.  When a bail agent is utilized, the bond is known as a surety bond.  In such a bond a bail agent provides the bail money while the defendant pays a fee of usually 10% of the actual bail cost.  When a defendant enters into such an agreement, they must guarantee they will show up in court on the date provided to them by the court.  If the defendants choose not to show up in court, known as bail jumping, bail agents often use bounty hunters to track down these defendants to bring them under the jurisdiction of the courts.  These bounty hunters have similar rights to police officers, and they are responsible for the rearrest of these defendants.

Bounty hunters provide incentives for defendants to show up in court since the thought of being tracked down by a bounty hunter is generally intimidating enough to make a defendant show up in jail.  Moreover, due to the financial position in which a bail agent has been placed, they will do anything to ensure the safety of their own money, which means bringing the defendants to justice.  It is a bail agent’s sole duty to guarantee the appearance of defendants in court at the specified time, and often, as statistics show, surety bonds prove to be the more effective means of preventing failed appearances in court.

Bounty hunters and bail agents also do not have the imposing limitations of a publicly funded police bureau.  Often, when defendants are release on their own recognizance, warrants for their rearrest are issued upon bail jumping, but due to the lack of time and resources available for these police bureaus, these defendants often go without rearrest.  Therefore, a substantial amount of time and money is wasted by not forcing these defendants to serve under the jurisdiction of the court. 

Frequently the terms of the own recognizance releases is not substantial enough to entice defendants into court appearances.  Yet, the thought of a bounty hunter and the binding duty a bail agent has to the defendant or more accurately to the money they have put up on behalf of the defendant, surety bonds will efficiently and effectively guarantee that a defendant is subject to the jurisdiction of the court, thus serving justice to the defendants.