How often are weapons involved?

As someone who is trying to get involved in this business i'm curious, how dangerous is it really? How often are weapons drawn on you, used, or even just found. Is it a weekly occurrence? Monthly? Yearly? Does anyone have any stories they would be willing to share? Thanks!

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Andrew Harrison
Phoenix, Arizona
No experience currently, but looking to get my feet wet

Fix up a signature line Herdo... I saw your introduction post, but we would like to have a bit more info on you.

I will let the more exciting members of this forum comment on this question... I am only allowed to carry one bullet and that is in my pocket... my gun is... uh... somewhere...

I usually only carry a lime green water pistol filled with Clorox...


Frankly Herdo... this business is like fishing or hunting.... it is usually many, many hours of total complete boredom, where you have trouble keeping your eyes open... ending in maybe 45 seconds of pure hell raising adrenalin rush excitement and then you take a nap. Truck driving was a lot more exciting...

You want excitement... drive a 40 ton double trailer truck on an ice covered road at 3am in the West Virginia mountains in February... with two empty trailers... now that will make your sphincter muscles contract....

Gunfights.... nah............ trust me Herdo... not much gun-play in this business... that's TV... this is real life... get your CDL... you'll make more money and have more excitement...




Ok folks, any of you big time FRA's can jump in with some really exciting stories... I haven't drawn my weapon in almost a week...

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Bill Marx, Sr.
"FREE STATE BAIL BONDS"
"FREE STATE INVESTIGATIONS"
DCJS: 99-176979
Cell: 434-294-0222

"Endeavor to Persevere" "Lone Watie"

"Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that , comes from bad judgment" "Will Rogers"

Since you are in the Phoenix area, if my grammar school geography memory is correct, you will probably have more news about drug dealing shootings than any other kind.

Is it dangerous? Can be.

But then again, a man was just stabbed to death less than a mile from my office, while walking to work in the middle of the day.

So walking can be dangerous.

I work on an armored truck, I've had a lit of people ask me the same questions...lol, I've had more people try to kill me doin other jobs...this one seems to logically be where the action would be, but no...
A lot of it depends on you. If you do your homework, and use caution where needed, you should be safe.

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Jeff B
Westland, MI
810-459-3556
I do ccw/cpl classes, and love to train. I would appreciate the opportunity to get some experience in his field, so if anyone can use any free help, I'm used to working in high risk and high liability situations.

Alot of BEA's work in this field without carrying a gun, A gun is used for defensive purposes ONLY....not as a compliance tool such as the police do. Anytime you introduce a weapon into the mix, your liability has just gone through the roof. Here are some rhetorical questions for thought:

1) What kind of weapons training do you have ? Will it stand up in court ?
2) How often do you re-qualify ? Do you use a firearms training record ?
3) How much range time do you put in ?
4) Are you insured ? Licensed ? Bonded ?
5) What calibre weapon do you carry ?
6) What kind of ammo do you use ? Bullet, grain load, hp or ball ? Handload or factory ?
7) In the heat of the moment, when you draw your weapon, you have intent to fire...so then you have to mentally micro-process at warp speed alot of different factors/calculations:
a) Terrain b) Backdrops c) other citizens in the immediate area d) bullet penetration.."shoot throughs"
etc.

Then you have a whole different set of training that should be required but isn't for our industry. Weapon retention. What kind of holster do you use ? What kind of grappling or wrestling training have you received in the form of body blocks, body twisting...where you keep twisting at the hips constantly thrusting your holster away from your attacker who is physically trying to take your weapon away from you ?

This isn't the old west...anytime you carry locked n loaded, whether in the line of duty or personal defense, you have just placed yourself in a very precarious position of being arrested, jailed or sued or any combination thereof.

Furthermore, if you are involved in a righteous shoot..that still doesn't protect you from lawsuits, loss of work (Most likely your clients will drop you immediately), exposure to the press....and worst of all the psychological damage all parties will endure...especially you. The nightmares can be hell.

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River City Associates
Decatur, Al. 35601

The vets covered it. I'll just add that I carry on every job, have only drawn twice and hope to God I can do this for 20 years and never pull the trigger.

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Tom Duprey
Founding member, NABBI (Nat'l Assoc. of Bail Bond Inv.)
Ca. Bail Agent Lic#1845795
Owner/Operator, Thomas Duprey Bail Bonds
Owner/Operator, Orange County Bounty
(714) 727-4689

Ruffin, that was a very informative post you just laid out there... hope the newbies will read it and consider its content... and OC... your a vet too buddy... I know you practice a lot... and are serious about weapons and the applications and consequences of their use....

I, on the other hand, continue to practice with my lime green squirt gun... I am deadly out to about 3 meters... and if you really piss me off... I will hit you with my purse.

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Bill Marx, Sr.
"FREE STATE BAIL BONDS"
"FREE STATE INVESTIGATIONS"
DCJS: 99-176979
Cell: 434-294-0222

"Endeavor to Persevere" "Lone Watie"

"Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that , comes from bad judgment" "Will Rogers"

As part of N.A.B.B.I. education and training, I , we, hope to offer weapons training. It has been suggested that maybe we can hold annual or semi annual trainings at places such as Frontsight or Balckwater.

If NABBI, sets the standards for the minimal weapons training a recovery agent should have, that may lead to the states that do not presently have such training to adopt ours.

Also, it can help in the case of a shoot and law suit, if someone can show that they have had some "acrredited" training from what we hope will be the nationally recognized bail recovery association.

Thank you for the replies everyone. Has anyone here seen the television series "Americas Hardest Bounty Hunters"? These BEA's literally get into a standoff in what seems like every other bust. They do have the SWAT/Raid mentality though, which is definitely not something that appeals to me. Also, I'd just like to say that I am aware a reality show is not the best source for fugitive recovery info, but I just thought it would be a good example for those of you that have seen it.

Trust me on this one, excitement isn't exactly my thing, haha. I really have no interest in kicking in doors, or suiting up for a raid. I am more interested in the actual skip tracing aspect of the job.

The first thing I remember seeing that really got my interested in fugitive recovery was the NatGeo special "Bounty Hunters". Robert Dick is someone I have looked up to since then and I really like the way he works. No need to kick in someones door when you can wait outside their house and grab them walking to their car.

I will set up my signature right now.

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Andrew Harrison
Phoenix, Arizona
No experience currently, but looking to get my feet wet

I can only speak for myself as everything is unique about every case/defendant. For me, and the guys who work for me, we have 2 types of attempted apprehensions: Tactical and plain clothes. Whichever 1 we use depends on the background of the defendant, geography, temperament of community, etc. For example, effecting an apprehension in a major urban city may be completely different than one in a small, white collar suburb...generally speaking.

Then you have factors such as children, timing, weather, dogs, etc. You really need to take some BEA courses and read as much as you can about a variety of subjects starting with your state laws, weapons doctrines your local agencies follow. For it is those doctrines that everyone will hold you accountable to because it is the only measurement of standards they have to compare to.

Then there are books on surveillance strategies, internet skiptracing, changing identities, etc. You should visit paladin press and review some of the books they sell. The more you learn about criminal behaviour, the better hunter you become.

Next, you need to take courses in proper interviewing/interrogation techniques, how to interpret body language, eye contact, changes in voice pitch, pupil dilation, nervous twitches, "panic smoking", etc.

Reading, training, and researching....

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River City Associates
Decatur, Al. 35601