I thought I would continue a discussion I had started earlier about Bush practice. Bush practice is the practice of attorneys in the rural areas of Alaska. And this state gives a new definition to the word rural. There are roughly 625,000 in this whole state. For perspective, Alaska is more than twice as large as Texas and more than three times as large as California. Just last week, I flew to Ketchikan to handle some business on a case. Ketchikan is 775 miles to the southeast. Within the next 6 weeks, I'll fly to Dutch Harbor, 775 miles to the southwest, to do a trial.
To say that Bush refers to the rural area is probably not 100% accurate. A lot of Southeast Alaska, the panhandle between Ketchikan and Juneau, could also be characterized as rural. Yet we generally talk about Southeast. Bush generally refers to West and Northern Alaska. If you look at a map of the state, you'll notice there are relatively few white lines, i.e., roads, throughout the state. Between Barrow and Prudhoe Bay is technically a road, but it is not well-traveled. Generally, Bush is west of the road between Anchorage and Fairbanks, and north of Fairbanks.
One big difference between Alaska and the rest of the country is in the bail statutes. There is not enough business in most of the Bush locations to support a bail bond company. So, how do people make bond? Alaska allows the court to order someone be released to a third party custodian (TPC). This is a person who will be the eyes of the court while someone is out pending trial. Conditions can very, but as you might expect, the court wants someone old enough to be responsible and without a criminal record, although this last condition can be waived if the criminal record is minor or old. Most of the clients are poor enough that they would not make bail.
Bail conditions are generally less strict in smaller communities. Bail is designed to protect the community and ensure that a defendant makes his court date. If someone is in New Stuyahok, for example, it would be hard for them to jump bail. First, there is really no practical way to get out of Bristol Bay without flying out of Dillingham. Most likely, the person would have to fly to Dillingham anyway. If they came down on the river (summer) or a snowmachine (winter), they would be spotted and the cops would know. If they did make it to the airport, they could not get on a plane without people knowing what was going on. Further, a lot of times a defendant would have literally lived all of his life in that village, which would have a population between roughly 75 and 600, with a few villages comprising up to 1000 - 1200 people. In those circumstances, a defendant is not going to take off. She has too many ties and is too connected to the area to leave.
This is not to say that no money was ever required. If someone had a long history, or no connection to the area (say someone working for the cannery or on a fishing boat), the court might require posting a bail with the court. And if someone was charged with a particularly serious offense, such as murder or sex assault, the court would be more likely to require a bond. One of the frustrating aspects of practice was repeatedly explaining to clients what the court would likely accept for bail. Summer was also extremely frustrating because of commercial fishing.
Words do not adequately describe commercial fishing and its impact in Bush Alaska. Generally, the first fishing period would be around June 20 - 25. During May and June, then, the population of Bristol Bay would swell from roughly 9500 to about 25,000 - 30,000. Some of those coming up would be guides or work in other areas, but many came up to commercial fish. Sometimes, and I know this will be hard to believe, they would drink a bit too much while they waited for Fish and Game to announce that they could begin commercial fishing. And a few of those who were drinking would get arrested. Those arrests played havoc with my schedule. I would get 4 -10 phone calls a day from frantic fishers demanding an immediate bail hearing so they could get out to go fishing. The calls usually got more frequent and urgent as high tide or a fishing opening approached.
Imagine 15 - 20 new clients (over a weekend) calling 4 -10 times a day demanding immediate bail hearings and you can imagine why even though practice in Bush Alaska is informal, it is generally not characterized as 'relaxed'. By and large, though, the system was designed to protect someone's right to bail in unique circumstances. Even though there are bail bonding agents in Anchorage, they would generally demand not only the cost of the bail but a great deal of security to pay for a flight out to the Bush to retrieve someone who failed to come to court. On a case involving a $1500 bail, by the time someone's paid their 10-15% plus the $350 airfare (if going to one of the hubs, such as Dillingham, Nome, Bethel, etc. If the residence is from an outlying village, you can take on $80 - 250 round trip to the Bush hub) and you can see why bond agents typically did not take bush cases. Hence, TPCs. In future posts I will elaborate on some of the bail issues and describe some of the more unusual bail hearings/requests that were presented.
