codered911
Junior Member
The State is California (L.A. County)
The original case revolved around some contractual matters to which the defendant ultimately lost the case (because they had no case) and the judgment was entered in favor of the plaintiff. The original judgment was somewhere in the neighborhood of 25K and some change. I should also point out that the defendant lost by default by failing to appear. Now ordinarily failing to appear is a perfectly legitimate so long as you do not mind loosing, but these individuals were busy in the background trying to “disappear”. The usual collection steps were taken; closed bank accounts were levied etc etc etc. Somewhere along the line it became rather apparent that chasing after the defendant was going to become more expensive than it might be worth. Interestingly enough the plaintiff decided to continue to peruse the matter under the premise of “principal” as legal costs were already close to if not in excess of the debt. (Bad business decision without a doubt, but it’s always nice to see that there are still people out there with some sense of conviction.)
Now before someone out there jumps all over me stating “don’t give us this sense of conviction stuff when you’re the one suggesting the rather ethically questionable notion of hiring an off duty sheriff to execute your self serving warrants” let me point out that during the course of this entire fiasco we discovered that the defendant in this case had made a business practice of signing contracts, accepting the delivery of the goods and services and then failing to pay on the contracts. We know of several other companies that made the mistake of dealing with them. For the sake of argument let’s just say the defendant is operating the oldest scam in the book, rip people off for small enough sums of money that they probably won’t bother to come after you. I should also point out that they have a rather annoying habit of changing the name on their operation and bank accounts on a pretty regular basis.
Moving on and to explain how the warrant came to be issued in the first place. We asked to court to order a debtors exam and as you probably guessed already our friendly defendant fail to appear. A rock solid paper trail was produced and we were able to compel the judge to issue a bench warrant for the individual that signed the contract (even though you technically can’t arrest a company, the company had a new name and bank accounts etc). Victory of sorts for us but it gets even better. We also managed to convince the judge to set bail in an amount in excess of the debt, under the premise that if and when this individual ran a stop sign we would simple ask the court to turn over the bail money to settle the debt. Needless to say this took some serious argument, but ultimately the judge found in our favor. Another victory of sorts, and we know eventually this individual will make a mistake a mistake and get caught. The problem is the arrest warrant details are sketchy at best, a name and a description… the company they work for (which will probably change in the next 18 months anyhow). Clearly this warrant isn’t going to make the top of the pile at the L.A. County Sheriff’s Office. Who can blame them as my understanding they simply have way more warrants sitting around that they can possibly serve in the next 20 years if that’s all they had to do.
Meanwhile this individual is answering phone calls on a daily basis and more than egger to sign a contract with its next victim. Happily operating their “business” from high atop their expensive offices in the Santa Monica area. Rather annoying to say the least which is why I posed my original question about hiring an off duty officer to bump into this person and arrest them. The concept of calling the sheriff and announcing I know where so and so is right now just does strike me as a viable approach. I don’t believe calling the sheriff and stating your about to make a citizens arrest works either. We’ve actually tossed around a lot of “ideas” on how to expedite this process. I just strikes me that such a “service” needs to exist in this world when you run into these sorts of circumstances.
The original case revolved around some contractual matters to which the defendant ultimately lost the case (because they had no case) and the judgment was entered in favor of the plaintiff. The original judgment was somewhere in the neighborhood of 25K and some change. I should also point out that the defendant lost by default by failing to appear. Now ordinarily failing to appear is a perfectly legitimate so long as you do not mind loosing, but these individuals were busy in the background trying to “disappear”. The usual collection steps were taken; closed bank accounts were levied etc etc etc. Somewhere along the line it became rather apparent that chasing after the defendant was going to become more expensive than it might be worth. Interestingly enough the plaintiff decided to continue to peruse the matter under the premise of “principal” as legal costs were already close to if not in excess of the debt. (Bad business decision without a doubt, but it’s always nice to see that there are still people out there with some sense of conviction.)
Now before someone out there jumps all over me stating “don’t give us this sense of conviction stuff when you’re the one suggesting the rather ethically questionable notion of hiring an off duty sheriff to execute your self serving warrants” let me point out that during the course of this entire fiasco we discovered that the defendant in this case had made a business practice of signing contracts, accepting the delivery of the goods and services and then failing to pay on the contracts. We know of several other companies that made the mistake of dealing with them. For the sake of argument let’s just say the defendant is operating the oldest scam in the book, rip people off for small enough sums of money that they probably won’t bother to come after you. I should also point out that they have a rather annoying habit of changing the name on their operation and bank accounts on a pretty regular basis.
Moving on and to explain how the warrant came to be issued in the first place. We asked to court to order a debtors exam and as you probably guessed already our friendly defendant fail to appear. A rock solid paper trail was produced and we were able to compel the judge to issue a bench warrant for the individual that signed the contract (even though you technically can’t arrest a company, the company had a new name and bank accounts etc). Victory of sorts for us but it gets even better. We also managed to convince the judge to set bail in an amount in excess of the debt, under the premise that if and when this individual ran a stop sign we would simple ask the court to turn over the bail money to settle the debt. Needless to say this took some serious argument, but ultimately the judge found in our favor. Another victory of sorts, and we know eventually this individual will make a mistake a mistake and get caught. The problem is the arrest warrant details are sketchy at best, a name and a description… the company they work for (which will probably change in the next 18 months anyhow). Clearly this warrant isn’t going to make the top of the pile at the L.A. County Sheriff’s Office. Who can blame them as my understanding they simply have way more warrants sitting around that they can possibly serve in the next 20 years if that’s all they had to do.
Meanwhile this individual is answering phone calls on a daily basis and more than egger to sign a contract with its next victim. Happily operating their “business” from high atop their expensive offices in the Santa Monica area. Rather annoying to say the least which is why I posed my original question about hiring an off duty officer to bump into this person and arrest them. The concept of calling the sheriff and announcing I know where so and so is right now just does strike me as a viable approach. I don’t believe calling the sheriff and stating your about to make a citizens arrest works either. We’ve actually tossed around a lot of “ideas” on how to expedite this process. I just strikes me that such a “service” needs to exist in this world when you run into these sorts of circumstances.
