My sister is in jail and we do not have the money to get her out on bail. What can I do?

Of course, if your sister is in bail, you would likely want to get her out so that she does not have to spend more time in jail than is absolutely necessary. However, for some families, posting bail is simply impossible or not something that the families think is a good investment. Here are your options when it comes to dealing with a loved one that is in jail:

Leave Them

If you have a loved one that is in jail, sometimes the hardest thing to do is to let that person stay in jail. However, you have to recognize that providing the money to bail the person out of jail might put more of a financial (and emotional) burden on your family than you and your loved ones can handle. For this reason, you may want to seriously consider letting your sister deal with the issue on her own. If she requests your help getting a bail bonding agent and will provide the bail money on her own, it might be okay to help her. However, providing the bail money for her might not be the best idea.

Check for her Own Recognizance

Make sure that your sister and her attorney have made every effort possible to be released from jail on her own recognizance. In many cases, if a judge believes that the individual will return to court in order to stand trial for the accused crime, the judge will allow the defendant to leave jail on his or her own recognizance. If this is the situation with your sister, then you will not have to worry about posting the money for her bail.

Contact a Bail Bonding Agency

A bail bonding agency can put up 100 percent of the money that is required for your sister’s bail. In order to provide this money, the agency will require a down payment from you or from your sister. This down payment is usually in the amount of about ten percent of the total bail amount. As such, if your sister is being held on $100,000, you will have to find $10,000 in order to get her out of jail while she awaits trial. Keep in mind that this money cannot be refunded to you, so it is money that is lost if you spend it on the bail bond.

Ask Friends and Others

If you fork over the full amount of the money for the bail for your sister, then you will get a full refund of the money as long as your sister returns to court in order to stand trial. If your sister does not return to court, then you will lose all of the money that you put up for bail. However, funding bail without going through a bail bonding agency is the most cost-effective way to meet bail, even though it can be extremely risky and your attorney might discourage you from doing so.