Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - CONFRONTING A BOUNTY HUNTER | UNTOLD STORIES

Episode Date: July 8, 2023

CONFRONTING A BOUNTY HUNTER | UNTOLD STORIES

I gently stepped over his body and I got my 9mm out and I started rubbing it against his nose. And all of a sudden he wakes up and his eyes got as big as dinner plates. And he goes, oh my God, you came all this way for me. And I go, yeah, and we're going back tomorrow. Hey, this is Matt Cox and I'm here with Tom Briner and Tom just came out with a new book and he is a former. bail bondsman bail bonds bounty hunter repo man

nice all right and he came up with a book and actually your second cousins of Tim McBride Tim McBride right so if you haven't seen Tim's video check it out

it's on the channel he was a huge marijuana smuggler and I'll bet that's pretty cool at like family reunions and stuff that you get to talk about Tim that book should be a movie everybody's all excited about that

I know everybody in my family thinks, you know, wow, what an upstanding citizen, that my brother turned out to be. So, all right. Yeah. So let's go ahead and let's get into it. He's got a bunch of stories about being about bounty hunting and just how the whole system works and tracking people down. And he's got a bunch of interesting stories. And that's going to be the podcast. So check this out.

Well, first of all, where are you from? Originally from Mansfield, Ohio or Ontario, Ohio, just a little suburb of the Mansfield. Okay. And I mean, how, like, how did you end up getting into, you know, doing the bail bondsman and stuff? Well, it's, it's kind of a funny story. I was, I was recruited to play basketball when I was 30 years old at college. So I, I, I went to a small school up in Minnesota for about a year, absolutely hated the school. So I ended up moving to Ohio. And I played for a small college there in Ohio, Ohio State Newark. And I was looking for a job one day because I was going to school during the day and wanted something to do at night. And I found an ad in the paper looking for a repo man, which I had no experience at.

But I thought, wow, that is a cool job. So I went and applied and lied my way into an interview. and about a few days later, they called me and they said I had the job. So that's how I actually got my foot in the door. And within the first month, I set the company record for the most repos. So I guess I had a knack for it. So when you go to find a car, like, I mean, to me, I feel like you're still in the car back, but you already have to key.

You just have to go find the car, right? Well, yeah, sometimes you have the key, sometimes you don't. Some of the finance companies will send you a key just because they know they're dealing with someone that maybe doesn't have great credit. So they might, you know. Want the key. Yeah, they might want an extra key. Or you can bet now you can't do this anymore, but back when I was doing it, you could actually go to a dealership and you could get a key made off the VIN number. and then you could just jump jump in it and go.

But every once in a while, you still have to knock on a door and try to get the keys from the people or just tow the car. Okay. So a lot of guys have tow trucks now. Yeah, well, now it's like all tow trucks. But I mean, I know 20, 30 years ago, these guys were practically stealing the cars back.

We started off with a car dolly. Then we mounted a winch on the dolly, just to winch the car up if we didn't have a key. right and then we moved into tow truck so yeah okay so how did that how long did you do that for oh i i did repos for probably 10 or 12 years okay yeah what does that what do repo guys get i mean what were you like per car yeah yeah you get uh so much per car and the farther you drive the more you get so back back then if i if i picked up a car in county i got 125 dollars for the car and if I, the farther I went out, I, you made more.

How long ago was this? Oh, gosh. This was back in the 90s. I mean, that was good money. That's good money. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, we were, we were bringing, you know, back then we were bringing in least

thousand bucks a week. So, I mean, back then, that was, that was pretty decent though. For a kid in college. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So what, so how, when did that, I mean, did that, move into the um you know the the the i'm sorry how many bail bonds do i want to say bail bonds or yeah i uh because it's kind of that goes along the same territory yeah bonds you're you're finding something either way you're finding a person or a car so uh yeah we had a a bail bond agency in

newark ohio where i lived at the time and a small town and word got around who the repo man was and the lady, her name was Yula Rizzo. She was an older lady, and she needed somebody to find people for her. And she called me one day, and she said, I heard you're really good at finding cars. And I said, yeah, I'm pretty good at it. And she says, well, how would you like to find people? So I said, yeah, I can do that. So I started working for her, worked for her for a couple years.

And then the company that underwrites her bonds and stuff, needed a bondsman in Mansfield, where I was originally from. So I jumped at the chance and we opened an office up there. So I'm going to go back for a second. You started doing the, it was the repos. Did you end up getting a degree? Like did you, you were going, you said you were kind of going through college. Yeah, yeah.

Why did you stay with repo and why did you continue to do the repo? Like, why didn't, did you get a degree in whatever and go with that degree or just you enjoyed too much? I did. I absolutely loved doing it. And I went to school for, I was going to be a gym teacher, basically, a physical education major. And I went for four years and as my wife is mad at me because I quit when I had three classes basically to go. And I never got my degree. Wow.

but uh you could do that at night now yeah you know but uh it was i don't regret a bit of it yeah but i mean what was going to change if you if you completed it you were still going to be yeah the repos yeah most likely so you so you opened up um would you call like an agency for yeah yeah yeah and i mean how does that work like do you have to get like how do you become a bail bondsman really well you have at the time you had to have a property and casualty license. So, and it has absolutely nothing to do with bail bonds, but you had,

I think it was basically a way for the state to try and monitor you. To monitor you and get some cash out of you for a license. So you, now you actually have a class that teaches bail bonds, what you're going to run into and, things. But back then, it was property and casualty. And once you had that, you were allowed to write bonds. That's nuts. I mean, I actually had my property casualty license in Florida. Yeah. I did it for, I was a like a workman's comp adjuster for like a year just out of college.

Yep, that's all you needed. Yeah, that's nuts. Like they didn't mention anything about bond. No, I was the only one in the class for bail bonds. So, all right, so then what happens? Like, I mean, you have to put up the money or is it a but you have to get a bond you have to what do you do well let's let's say you were you got arrested for domestic violence me you and you came to me and they said or a relative because you're in jail would come to me and say i need to bond out my boyfriend husband whatever and i would go over to the court and i would basically write them a check for whatever the bond is It's $10,000, let's say it's a $10,000 bond. So I write them on, it looks like, this looks like a big check, basically.

Right. And it would be for the amount of $10,000 to make sure that you show up a court. And your portion of that, you would owe me $1,000. So that's how we made our money. I would make, I would make $500 on the deal. The insurance company that underwrites me, they make $500 on the deal. so that's basically how you write a bond it's it's not difficult okay how is it work now like don't you have to get a now you said you have a tat you have a because they don't cash the check no

they they can if if your person doesn't show up for court do they give you time to like if they don't then how do you get the money back they you you don't get it back if if they don't show up You can get them to give you some extra time if you talk to the judge. You say, hey, judge, I need 30 days. I can find this guy. He'll go, okay, not a problem. Let you go find him. If you don't show up with him and put him back in custody, drop him off to jail,

they're going to cash that check. Okay. And I'm proud to say I've never lost anybody. All right. So, but, I mean, people are running, though. I've had them run from one side of the country to the other, and I've ended up finding them. In fact, if you want a quick story. Yeah, that's what I'm hoping for.

I had a young man, and it wasn't a big bond, I think it was a $10,000 bond, and he took off to Lake Tahoe. And, of course, I'm in Mansfield. And I searched and searched for this kid, and I couldn't find him anywhere. And that's when I always say a good repo man or a good bondsman knows how to improvise. So I did a lot of my own skip tracing, which basically is talking to people trying to find out where this guy is. So I called his mom, and I ran one of my favorite scams on her. And I said, I'm a buddy from high school. right back in the area

loved to get together with Mike right and uh she says oh well she goes that's wonderful she goes Mike moved out to Lake Tahoe and he's a ski instructor and I said oh okay oh that Mike

yeah and so when I got out so you know after after I checked a few things out I could I had another girl that worked with me named Tracy and she was an excellent skip tracer and she ran a social security number and stuff and found out where he was working out there and stuff. So I had a pretty good idea where he was and got on a plane, flew to Reno. From Reno, I grabbed a car and drove up to Lake Tahoe and found the trailer he was living in. It was a nice little trailer part. Of course, he wasn't home

during the, you know, he wasn't home that day and he wasn't a ski instructor. He had applied to to be one, but he ended up being in construction out there because it was booming back then. And I showed up at his trailer that night, knocked on the door, and two guys answered. They were sitting in there playing video games. And I said, hey, where's Mike at? And they said, oh, he's back in the bedroom sleeping. And I said, well, let me go surprise him. So I walked back in there.

So I walked back in and he's laying on a mattress on the floor. floor, no bed frame or anything like that. And I gently stepped over his body and I got my nine millimeter out and I started rubbing it against his nose. And all of a sudden he wakes up and his eyes got as big as dinner plates. And he goes, oh my God, you came all this way for me. And I go, yep, and we're going back tomorrow. So that's how I found him. So what do you do? You cuff him and you stay the night at a motel or something? Yeah. It cuffed him to the, bed frame and waited the next morning and he promised he was going to be a good guy on the plane. So we flew back to Mansfield and I dropped them off.

Okay. So what do you get for that? Well, you own the, you own the place, though. Well, yeah, but that comes out of my pocket. So instead of paying the court $10,000, I was out a couple plane tickets. Yeah, yeah. And a few meals. Right, right. Yeah, it's way better. Yeah. Okay. I was going to say, poor Mike, like he's not, he's not living well. He's, he's sleeping on a mattress on the floor. Like, when I was on the run, like, I wasn't living like that. Like, you're not. And he's using his own name. Like, he's, he's an amateur. Yeah, it's, it's craziness. So, um, I mean, can you, are there any, any others that you track down? Like, how long did you do this? Uh, probably. I, I wrote bonds for, three and a half years, and I, I attract people down for other bondsmen for a couple of years, too. So, you know, five, six years, they did that. Right. Do you have any, anybody else that took off? Yeah. I mean, I, I, I had a guy, I mean, not as far as going out to Reno, but

I've had people go hide with other people and hide with grandma and things like. that and uh but uh and then i also picked up people like i said i did i did a lot of work for other bondsmen i would get calls from different states and say listen we think our guys in ohia can you find him for us and i would track them down then i would load them up and take them halfway and meet in the middle get paid and and then you know they take him from there right so i mean do these guys i mean you know mike went quietly do all of them just all of You got me. No, and you'd be surprised.

Most of them do. And I was, I think I was smart about it. I, I wasn't big on kicking indoors and, and wrestling somebody to the ground, which I've done, but very sparingly, I would always do more of a stakeout kind of thing. And if I knew there was five of his buddies in the apartment with them, I wasn't going in there because it's going to be nothing. but pure confrontation. It could go bad. I would wait till I see the guy come out by himself, walk into his car, walk up behind him and say,

hey, guess who I am? And usually they're so surprised, you know, before they even have a chance to think I've got him in cuffs and we're on the way back to the jail. So, yeah, I haven't had, I really, you know, a lot of people always ask me what, what's more dangerous? And I said, repo in a car is more dangerous. because I look at it this way.

You know, a lot of these guys I'm getting out of jail and writing bonds for have been there before. Yeah. And they know the system. And they know that, okay, this guy's going to take me back. I'm going to make a phone call. I'll use a different bail bondsman. They'll come get me out and I'm out in 24 hours.

Right. You take a person's car. How am I going to get? get to work. How am I going to get my kids of school? The neighbors are going to see. I got to call mom and dad for money. Yeah. I mean, it opens up a big can. And people get pissed when you take their car. Because they feel like they own it. Yeah. I feel like you're taking my stuff, not the fact that, no, I'm taking the bank stuff back. Like, you don't have the title of this car. Exactly. You don't really, people realize like, you don't really own your car. You have it registered.

your name and the bank can pick it up if you're a day late or you're three months late and most of them do they'll wait until about the third month and they know they're not getting paid so that's when they usually pop yeah all right have you ever been shot at or i have been shot at once and i've probably had two or three times people putting a gun to my head but uh was this for repo or for this was for repoing uh now one of them was completely innocent. It was a semi that I was repoing and I, as soon as I walked to the guy's door, I had a shotgun in my face. But it's because it wasn't because I was there to pop his car. It's because there was a lot of breakings in the area. They seen me outside walking

around, checking the place out looking for this truck. It looks suspicious. Yeah. So as soon as I walked up, I had the gun, right? I mean, I completely, and as a repo man, you're not allowed to carry a gun. Right. So some do, but you're not supposed to. And then the only time I was ever shot at, and I won't, and I'll take that back. I wasn't, I personally wasn't shot out my partner was. I recruited one of the kids off the basketball team to go help me pick up a car. Old Trans Am.

And the guy lived out in the middle of nowhere in a single wide trailer, car's setting right out front. I had keys for it. I hand, every, everybody works for me, wants to be the one that gets a car because it's something they're going to talk about the next 10 years of their life. So I gave him the keys. His name was Wes McQueen. Jump like a deer playing basketball. Great guy.

And he went up, got in the car. I took off down the driveway. I heard the car start up. And I heard this big bang. I go, oh, that thing must have backfired. So I'm driving down the road. And I go down a couple streets, turn off, and West follows me. And he jumps out of the car, and he goes, that guy shot at me.

I go, no, man, that's a backfire. He goes, Tom. He goes, I swear to God, he shot at me. So we walked around the back of the car, and he was little fiberglass fins that you used to have on the firebirds and transams. you could actually see the the shot marks from the he was that close it was close enough to put small dents in the back of the rubber and the fiberglass but wasn't close enough to break anything so we pulled in I said well what do you want to do I said we can call the cops when he and I said but if we do that they're going to take the car they're going to hold us you know impound it and all that stuff and I said and we ain't going to get paid right So he said, what do you want to do? And Wes said, I'd rather have the money. So that was the only time I ever was fired at.

Let's put it that way. Okay. Any, I mean, anything else happened or anything that strikes you as interesting? When I first started, I didn't have, like I said, I didn't have a tow truck, but I had a to towing company that would tow for me. And it was in Newark, Ohio, and his name was Yote. We called him Yogi, big guy. And we were hooking up a car at an apartment complex.

And just as we were getting it up in the air and starting to strap down the tires, about four or five guys pile out of this apartment and saying, well, you can't have the wheels. Those are mine. And I put a air filter on there that's mine and all this kind of stuff. And I said, no, man, I said, if it's on the car, it goes with the car. And they started to come after us and Yogi picks up a J-hook, which is a big chain with a hook on the end of it looks like a J. And he starts swinging this thing around his head.

So while he's doing that, I'm strapping down the tires. And, you know, they never got close enough. But, but, but, but they wanted to. But, uh, that was, that's really about the only, the couple of times that I've, really hasn't any danger at all, but, um, well, uh, so what, um, what, so what, what happened with, um, with your, well, first of all, when did you, you retired from doing this recently? No, I, I've been out of this, uh, since, oh gosh, uh, early, uh, uh, early, uh, 2000s, I worked for a company called Skipco up around the Cleveland area for a little while.

And then my wife and I opened up a towing business. Okay. And we ran a towing business for several years in the Mansfield area. Okay. When you did the skip tracing, did you ever use, like, didn't, aren't there, there are systems, right? Like Lexus Naxis? Oh, yes. It's, it's amazing.

Extensive. Yeah, what you can find out, even if you, I mean, just running a social security number is going to tell you where a person works and their credit rating. And, I mean, and then you can find out, like you said, through LexisNexis or a couple other different sites, who their relatives are. I mean, a whole chain of people. Yeah, where they've ever lived. Oh, yeah.

It's scary how much you can find. out for a few dollars yeah well i mean when you grab these guys did any of these guys ever um did they ever have fake IDs on them or you have to recognize the guy yeah and i always took a picture as soon as i bailed somebody out you know those old instomatic cameras yeah yeah i would uh like the polar polaroid camera yep and i is every person i'd take a picture as soon as i walked out of jail. So, you know, when you're picking up for somebody for somebody else, that can be a problem. And I had one girl lied to me for a while. And I bet I spent two hours in a apartment questioner just to make sure I had the right person because I wasn't leaving unless I knew I had

the right person because then you get a whole other can of worms. Right. So are you allowed, I have a question is, are you allowed to like, if you know the person's inside. Yes. Like I saw you walk. I know it's you. I saw you walk in. I'm 100% sure it's you and they close the door and lock the door. Are you allowed to go in? Yeah. It's um it matters what state you're in and I know things have changed a little bit since I've done it. But as long as I knew that that person was in there and I had an address on a piece of paper that that person wrote saying when somebody gets out of jail, I say you need to give me several references where you lay your head at night. Right.

So I wouldn't make them write down several different addresses. So I had the ability to go in after them. Like in Ohio, if I had a reasonable suspicion, that person was in there, I could go in there. Now I think you have to have of, you know, that person had a right. a physical address down when you bonded him out of jail of where he's going to be. And they, let's put it this way. If, if, if, if I knew you were hiding in an apartment complex, I can't go through that apartment complex and kick every door down.

Right. Because I know, because I've seen you walk in the building. I've got to know what apartment you're in. But if I know what apartment you're in, I've got the right to go in there and get. get you because basically when it will when you write a bond that person is giving up his rights right so i mean i don't need a search warrant i don't have to have police backup but they will back you up on a bond if you need them but as long as long as i know that you're in there i'm probably going to come in after you right so so i mean has that happened oh yeah yeah yeah

that's happened a couple different times were you ever concerned that yes and the and the first time I did it I got called down to the police department and I always my boss always gave me a it was a three fold pamphlet of everything a bondsman is legally allowed to do with the codes and everything written on it so when I got you know they they called me one day and I said we we heard you kicked in an apart apartment door and I said yeah I did and uh you know well what gives you the right to do that and I just hand them that paper and they'd read it over go okay you're good to go so because a lot believe it or not a lot of the police officer have no idea what a bondsman was loud or not allowed to do right so well I mean have you ever grabbed anybody and they had like a fake ID or something or

just just one girl and it was uh like I said I after I questioned her for a you know, a while and things weren't adding up. Oh, she had a fake? I thought she just gave you a, I thought she just gave you a, just gave you a, just gave you the wrong name. She actually had an ID. Yeah, yeah, she had an ID. And I was with one of my partners, his name was Kevin.

And, and he, uh, he actually saw through it first. And then we talked about it. And I go, yeah, I think you're absolutely right. And when we got her, it was who she said she was. So she finally gave it up when the police down to the station. Um, so what about the, uh, the, uh, the, uh, the, uh, story about the, the kid? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, well, you know how you go to the department of motor vehicles and you wait in line?

I've been many, many times. Exactly. And I hated to go there and thank God they can let you send them a check now. But, but, but I'm sorry. Uh, I had a repo, and the lady worked for a department of motor vehicles, and I said, ha, ha, revenge time. Right. So I went to her place, and the car was sitting there, and I backed up to it, and had it up in the air.

A lot of times I go up and knock on the door and say, listen, I'm repoing your car. It's up in the air. If you want to come out and clean your stuff out of it, you can do that. And, of course, they're giving you every sob story in the world. You know, I'll make my payment tomorrow, or can I? I pay you or well I mailed it or you know you get every excuse in the world I said you know I'm sorry I've got to take your car and uh as I was doing that I seen a little boy come out she must know I've been about three years old and he's listening to everything the conversation between my

mom or his his mom and me and uh I was around the back of the car taking the plates off because I always give the purse and their plates back. And all of a sudden I see, I feel somebody pulling on my, my coat. I said, what? I look around and there he is. And he's standing right beside me. And he holds his piggy bank up. Aw.

And he said, will this pay for my mom's car? I felt like the biggest heel in the world when that happened. And, but yeah, that, every once in a while you get a story like that and it uh it just kills you i think that that night i just said you know screw this i'm going home going to bed but uh but i wrote in the book i hope that kid i hope that kid turned into something and can buy his mom a new car because he he definitely he he definitely would have done that when he was three right so i i'm sorry when you you it's when you said the checks in the mail or that they've mailed it or I had a mortgage broker we used to play

pranks on each other all the time and one of my other mortgage brokers was doing a loan for a guy for a limited time at McDonald's enjoy the tasty breakfast trio your choice of chicken or sausage mcmuffin or mcgrittles with a hash brown and a small iced coffee for five bucks plus tax available until 11 a.m. at participating McDonald's restaurants price excludes flavored iced coffee and delivery. The new BMO ViPorter MasterCard is your ticket to more. More perks, more points, more flights, more of all the things you want in a travel rewards card, and then some. Get your ticket to more with the new BMO ViPorter MasterCard and get up to $2,400 in value in your first 13 months. Terms and conditions apply. Visit BMO.com slash ViPorter to learn.

more a tow truck company and my other mortgage broker had been he'd been there a month or two and he actually had after a couple weeks came up to me and said I hate to mention say this but you know I got these two loans that are closing and I'm like right right he said my car payments way behind and he said it's a buy here pay here a lot I was just like wow and you know like how bad is it it's um and he and he was like yeah they're going to take my car he said so is there way you could give me some money up front. I was like, how much you need? I don't know what it was like two payments behind.

They were like 300, 400, 400 bucks a piece. I was giving like 800 bucks or whatever. Well, so he said, okay, cool. So he took the money. Well, like the following day or the day after, I remembered like the guy, the customer that had the tow truck company showed up to sign some paperwork. And I went, whoa. I said, hey, so I told the broker, come here.

I said, listen. And I told him about what had happened with this guy. The guy's name was John Sloan, actually. So I told him, John Sloan is behind his car payment. He's afraid they're going to show up and take his car. And he goes, okay. I said, so I need you to get your customer to back up to the, backup to his car and take it. And so like go to put it on.

So his customer comes in and he goes, okay, what do you want me to do? And I said, I want you to back up, you know, it had the thing that went, you know, and went under. Like, he didn't have to get out to pick it up. Exactly, yeah. I said, start that hole. He said, okay, look, I'm not going to pick it up. Like, I'm going to get down there and I'm going to jiggle it and make it look like it. He said, but I'm not going to actually touch the car.

And I said, okay, that's fine. I said, it's going to make the beep of noise when you back up, though. He goes, oh, yeah, yeah, no, it'll be a show. And I said, okay. So John Sloan, his desk was just like it. He faced like inward and the back of his of his desk was a glass, was all glass to the parking lot. Right. And there was, and there were blinds, many blinds behind him.

So he's sitting there on the phone and like, so we're all kind of outside. Like I've told everybody. He has no clue. So there's like 10 of us now. A couple guys inside, three or four or five of us standing outside, a couple guys at the window. And all of a sudden we start hearing that beep, beep. And so he's on the phone with somebody, he's like, or some customer or something. He's like, yeah, uh-huh.

No, no. Yeah. He's like, yeah, well, this is what happens. And he's like, yeah, I don't know. I don't know. Somebody's car is getting towed or something. I don't know. Yeah, I don't know.

They're backing up a, I don't know what the noise is. Yeah, yeah. Because it's, it's, he goes, hold, hold on. And, you know, does the blind, you know, blighter. And he goes, I got to go. And hangs out there, runs over the guy. And he's like, and he was, Sloan was a big guy. Yeah.

And he's like, he's like, hey, wait a minute, where. And the guy's like, yo, man, they didn't get. It's your payment. No, I popped. I did. I dropped it off yesterday. I went yesterday. He's like, bro, I got you're on the order today. I got to take the car, man. I don't know what to tell you. And the guy's actually doing the lever and just making it go. Yeah, right? He's just making it noise. It's not doing anything. Sloan is like, I gave him the money. I swear I got the money. I got it to give it to the guy. I got a receipt. I got to receive it to the guy. I got to receive. I got to receive. I got to receive. I got to get a receipt. I got to get a receipt. And the guy's kind of. laugh starts kind of laughing right and then we're so he keeps looking up at us doesn't realize like everybody's outside right like he and he told me later he said you know what the whole problem was he said i was actually sitting there thinking like i know i paid he said you know you gave me the money i went down there and paid the next day he said he said so i know i'm getting the car back he said but i was like this is so humiliating oh it's embarrassing these guys are they're going to tow my car and i just started working here

And all these guys are, you know, he's like, it was horrible. And I mean, at this point, we're bawling laughing. We're all just done. And he's like, he's like, that's when he finally realized like, something's wrong. Why are these guys laughing? Nobody's this much of a jerk that there are, that these, there's like six, seven people at this point who are laughing. Anyway, so he was like, what then? And the guy was like, yeah, man, they're just messing with you, bro.

I'm not taking your car. It was just, but he's like, man, you guys, he started yelling at us and screaming. And he was laughing. Anyway, so that's what, that just makes me think when you think you're, beep, beep, beep. Oh, yeah. It was a good, good time. Yeah. Only because he didn't get his car towed.

Right. If they'd really take it his car, he would have been upset. Oh, yeah. And you get all kinds of excuses. I mean, it's, it's crazy. It's, you know, like I said, I put the check in the mail or, you know, I got to, I've got to buy groceries. everything's an excuse. And you know, the funny thing was,

you would not believe the amount of doctors that I've repoed. Oh, yeah. Just because they make so much money, they don't even think of worry about paying their bills. Some of the worst, by the way, one of the worst credits I've ever seen

was from a doctor. And lawyers. Doctors and lawyers. And, yeah, horrible. Months behind. And one of the guys, when he came in, I remember asking him like, Or you're like, you make good money.

Like, you're behind, you've got three, you've got a 90 day late. You've got three 30 day late on your credit cards. He's like, well, I mean, yeah, but he said it's not a lot of money. I'm like, that's the problem. It's like 50 bucks, $40, $60. Like, he's like, yeah, well, I wait until it adds up to something. And I'm like, this is before credit. Yeah, people didn't, weren't quite as credit savvy as they are now.

Right. Like, it doesn't matter if it's 50 cents. You have to write the check. for 50 cents. And he was like, what was it matter? I wait till it adds up. I mean, I was like, I mean,

so I've had some of them, it's almost like, like you almost have to make an effort to be this bad at your credit. Oh, yeah. And you'd be surprised on me blame us on their wife's.

Yeah. Well, she must not have paid it or it didn't come out of my bank account. Like, oh, come on, man. But, yeah.

Uh, God. Yeah. Um, so, you took the little kid's mom's car I mean did you feel bad oh I've felt horrible absolutely horrible but that but it had to go and my thing was I'm getting back at the DMV but yeah that didn't work man I've I've sat in so many DMVs too um oh and they're so rude like

90% of them just they hate your guts like why did you take this job if you really hate people the way you clearly hate people like why did you take this job So what ultimately, what ended up happening with, you had a partner in this, right, in the business, right? Yeah, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I got my, I, I, I got my, they were looking for somebody up in the Mansfield area at that, that, that, that, sorry, at that time, I lived in Newark. And, uh, so I called my buddy, Todd, Duffner. And he lived, he lived, he still lived in Mansfield. And I said, hey, I got a really, really. good job for you. And he went out with me on a couple of repos. He goes, yeah, he can do this. So Todd and me repoed all over the state. And he ended up also doing bail bonds with me. And he actually took over my bail bonds business when I bought the towing business. And we worked together so well. And I mean, there was nights we could pick up together, you know, both in the same

truck just address to address we'd pick up seven eight cars a night and those were great paydays when we were doing that and uh one day Todd walked into my office and he put his arm on my desk and he goes look at this and I could see all the muscles in his arm just twitching and he goes I'm I'm not trying to do this it's just happening and Todd was a big fisherman a hunter and he was I mean, a great day for Todd is when he's in the woods. And he went to the doctor and the doctor said, we probably got a tick bite. Sometimes if you get a tick bite, that's what happens.

He goes, but I'm going to run some tests. So he, you know, a few days later, he came back in and he said, I've got Lou Gehrig's disease, ALS. And he had just got married. He had just had his first kid. and that was Todd's... I'm sorry. No, it's fine.

How old was he? Excuse me. I think he was in his 40s at the time. Um, he, I mean, he just, he, that was his, that was his dream to have a family. And in a very short time, he was gone. And, excuse me, it was, uh, it was, uh, it, it, it was tough. and he's one of the reasons I live in Florida right now, excuse me, is because I knew, you know, when that happened, life's short.

And I told my wife, I said, as soon as our girls get out of college, I go, we're moving. And I said, I want to move to Florida, want to retire, want to take it easy. And I said, we got enough money to do it. And that's what we did. but I think of him every day and you talk about him in the book

yeah one of the last chapters in the book's about Todd okay super guy super guy great family grew up with him we're in track together played ball together um it's been

we graduated in 1979 and I think we still both hold track records at the school we graduated from. I mean, he, the boy could run. Boy, could he run? And I've got a great story about him. He was, we were out repo, and I think we were looking for an S-10 pickup. And he went up to check the VIN number of a car out in the middle of nowhere on a farm. and he went up.

He checked the VIN number. And all of a sudden I hear all these dogs barking. And I've got my beams on my truck down real low, just the running lights on. And all of a sudden I see Todd running right across the front of my truck and three dogs after him, all weiner dogs. But it was so dark, he couldn't tell. So I see him running down the road like all hell

And these three dogs just chasing him Three dogs just chasing him down And so I start up the truck And I turn You know, I'm going down the road And pretty soon he's running up beside the truck And I grab him I go, they're weiner dogs, man, they're weiner dogs

So we turn around and head back And I said, he goes, Oh, that's not the right It wasn't the right VIN number on that truck. But I see all these dogs in unison following each other just wobbling back to the barn.

Oh my God, it was hilarious. But yeah, he, they got a lot of great memories of Todd. Well, that's good. Yeah. That's good. How long have you been in Florida? We've been down here

a little over three years now. Okay. All right. No. What's the target? I had this one guy We Todd and he knocked on the door

And he wasn't where he's supposed to be So that was strike one And then we Todd wasn't where he was supposed to? No the the guy to skip bail Wasn't where he was supposed to be Okay Wasn't living where he was supposed to be

So I found a girlfriend's address Went to her house And knocked on her door and she said No I haven't seen him I said no he's in here I know he's in here I said, I said, we got to come in and he goes, she goes, well, you need a search warrant. And I go, no, I said, I don't need a search warrant.

So we pushed through her and Todd went upstairs and I searched the first floor and Todd comes down and he goes, man, she's right. Yeah, that guy's not here. And I go, I know he's here. And I go, did you check the attic? And Todd goes, no, I didn't check the attic. So we go upstairs and behind the dresser, there's an attic act. You know, it's not a, there's actually a room in the attic, but on the sides, there's, you know, four or five feet there that there's an access door to.

So I get my maglight flashlight out and I move the dresser and we, I'm peeking down through both sides of the eaves and they had cellulose insulation blown in, which is that newspaper, dirty kind of insulation. And at the end of the attic, I see this lump, you know, like a big mound. And I go, man, that don't look right. So I take a, and I don't want to crawl in this 105 degree attic, you know. And so I take a battery out of my flashlight. And I gave it a toss down there and whack, I hit that thing, a little big lump. And all of a sudden that guy jumps up. He was up there completely covered insulation hiding from us.

And it was over a stupid $5,000 bond, which he's going to get 30 days. and go home. I mean, it was just something ridiculous. And so on the way out of the attic, he's crawling through trying to hit every two-by-four beam and all of a sudden his leg goes through the ceiling of the, you know, the bedroom down below. So now they got a big hole in their bedroom ceiling

and he crawls out and I'm not kidding you. This guy was, I called it tard and feathered because he is completely covered in this stuff. We get him outside, and he goes, man, he goes, don't take me to jail like this. He goes, let me hose off. So he stood there as we're hosing them off. He's completely soaked head to toe. We got all the stuff off of them, put him in the car, take him down to the Mansfield City jail.

And the jailer comes out to take him back to the cell, and he's just looking at this dude going, and then he looks at us, and he's just shaking us head. And I said, you know, that's what happens. but yeah that was that was another good one yeah and the book like I said it's it's full of it's full of great stories like that you know it's a it's a good read I think people like it right um so you would mention one of the things you said people ask you about like is it like the you know is doing it like um what was it you would we mentioned was it oh what dog the Bounty Hunter?

Oh. I actually was going to mention that when we were talking earlier. Yeah. Before we sat down, I was going to say, well, there's a lot of fake shows on TV. I know there was a couple of repo shows on TV that were completely fake and they try to pass stuff off as reality. And Dog is, you know, I'm sure he does a good job and everything, but... You know, people, I see him on the news a lot and people interviewing him and stuff.

And I'm thinking to myself, you know, I did this for several years. And I rarely had people skip bond on me. Right. And when you write a bond, you take, you look at the person, you look at his credit, you look at his family. you look at is he going to stick around you know and there's different check things you have to check off of a list to make sure this guy's going to show up for court and my thing with that show is if you can't tell somebody that's going to show up for court and you're just going to sit there and write bond after bond after bond and you have so many bonds out there. and so many people you're chasing down that they can make a TV show? Are you a really a good bondsman?

Yeah. So that's my big thing with him. I'm thinking, you know, if you can go on TV and have a show every week of several people you're chasing down. Was he chasing all of, are these all his people?

Or are that he chasing other guys also? I think he does chase other guys bonds too but then again he's in Hawaii most of the time so it's not like that's not a huge community exactly so and and there ain't trust me there's bondsmen out there that'll write anything that comes along but do you really want to spend all your time out chasing people when you could be writing more bonds making more money i mean you do if you have a tv show well i mean that's true but uh take nothing away from the guy but uh And let's see, I just wouldn't call him a top-to-your-bonds.

And then when he gets involved and like that girl that went missing in the down-haring. Well, it's, you know, it's entertainment. I mean, he's a character. Yeah, and I understand marketing. But when you're crouching down beside a fire pit and looking at the ashes and rubbing him between your fingers and going, ah, he was here. Come on, man. I mean, people don't be so gullible.

he's checking the dirt foot footprints it's him he's wearing someone else's two sizes too big it's definitely bobby um yeah he uh he's he's he's definitely out there i was love at the end of the show where he he he tries to like lecture them and try to get their life right and tells them about himself and tells him about how he changed his life and how he it's just like stop it bro yeah it's nobody it's in one ear at the next yeah yeah So, yeah. It's funny because, you know, when I was locked up, I read, and I don't know if you know who this is, you've heard Stephanie Plum? Stephanie.

No, I have heard. So there, I want to say it's Stephanie Plum. Janet Ivanovich writes about her, and she, she's a bounty hunter. There's been a movie about her. She was a bounty hunter. There's a bunch of book. There has to be 14, well, there may be 30 books now. I read probably 13 or 14 of them.

Oh, now that you said that, I think I do remember that. As a series of, like, paperbacks or something she put out. She's a clutz. She's a clutz that ends up a bounty hunter because it's good money. She's constantly forgetting her gun. She's being shot at. She keeps getting, you know, beat up. Like, people are chasing her. She's chasing them.

But they're actually hilarious, bro. Like, you know it's ridiculous. I know it's ridiculous. But the characters in it, the funniest thing about the characters in it are the fact that these are real people. Like, these are all, you can tell like that there is some nut job out there. Like this is, you're dealing, the kind of people you have to deal with in that industry. Right. You're arresting the same people over.

Oh, yes. And over. Have you, how many, have you arrested people over over over? Oh, yeah, two, three different times on several different people. And they, I mean, it's like they've got their, my phone number tattooed on their arm. I mean, they just know. call Tom we'll get it he'll get us out and and they show up for court so I'm not you know of course that's great I mean I yeah I have you ever have you ever chased down the same person has that same

person run twice or if they run once you don't every oh no they run once I don't I don't I don't don't call me again no no let somebody else deal with that do you ever go after I'm like if so you put up a $10,000 bond and you're saying that it's a thousand dollars cost them $1,000 to get the bond. Right. You're getting 500. Then they take off. So now they take off and you have to chase them and it costs you $1,200 to catch up with them. Do you turn around and bill them? Like do you say, hey, or you're saying you're not going to get that money anyway? I don't bill them, but on some bonds, I always took some collateral. Right. I've had motorcycles. I've had cars. I even had a hot wheel collection that I walked into the guy's house and he had him under glass on his wall and I knew in my head

he values that yes yeah so I said that yeah so I'm taking that with me so you know think there's way you know there's there's there's ways to make sure people show up for court so but yeah and like said I I've I've been blessed as far as people showing up I haven't had a ton I'm sure my, the book, I've got two to three times of many repo stories as I do bond stories because I was smart at writing bonds and I still made a decent living at it. What about, did you ever take a, do you ever place to lean on anybody's house? Oh, yeah, yeah. I had, I had one guy, the police, he was laundering money and he had over a million dollars

in foil wrapped, wrapped up in his freezer. And the feds, yeah, the feds busted him and he owned his own home. He owned a vending machine business. And I would write a mortgage on his house or a lien, put a lien in some type of lien. And that's another story. When I first started working there at Mansfield, my, I would go to, go to down to the clerk of courts or the recorder's office and I would, you know, stand there and everybody knew I was the bondsman. So the bondsman. Nobody wanted to help the bondsman. So I would

stand there and I'd wait in line and, you know, trying to get somebody to help me because they had to file this or file that. And I wasn't getting much cooperation. And one day I walked in and I held up a $50 bill, and I said, if anybody will help me, I'll give you $50 right now. And then, come to find out, they found out that I was dating my current wife, Melanie. And I would walk in, and as soon as they knew I was dating her, because everybody and she was a legal secretary in town, everybody knew Melanie. So when I walked in, then all the girls at the clerks off would be running right up. Oh, what can we help you with, Tom? I said, well, I guess it's who you know.

Yeah. You got to stay in her good graces. Exactly. Things don't go well with Melanie. You never get helped again. The 50's not even going to help. That's true. Oh, there's that Tom. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Okay. So, uh, so did you, have you, you never foreclosed on anybody's house? No, never had to. Never had to. Never had to. So what if they didn't own the house? Well, if they had a mortgage. Well, we made sure that there was. enough equity in that house yeah yeah and i and i've heard stories of bondsmen and big city owned in four or five restaurants and things like that just because they've had a right foreclose on people and stuff so but no headache here so that's good okay anything uh can

anything else you want to talk about yeah do you want to plug the book yeah uh asphalt hunter it's on uh Amazon, Barnes & Noble, a lot of other different sites. And give it a read. Two stories of a bounty hunter slash repo man. And I guarantee you every story in there is gospel. I like asphalt hunters. That's a good title. Spent a lot of time on the road looking for people and cars.

That's for sure. I have one more question. Are you allowed to carry? weapon? Yeah, yeah, if licensed and stuff. Yeah, if you have like a concealed weapons permit. Because in Florida, it's concealed, you have to have it concealed. And I know other states, like I remember being in Tennessee, I would see guys with the gun.

Like, you couldn't carry, you couldn't get a concealed weapons license. What you had in Tennessee was, you had a carry permit and you had to be able to see the gun. Yeah, in Ohio at the time, there wasn't a, when I first started, there wasn't a concealed carry law. But there was a specific thing in the law that said if you were in a dangerous position, if you're carrying large sums of money, like to a bank or something like that, they gave you like a waiver on that. So I never had a problem with, I know, I'd walk in the police department with the gun as long as I put in the locker when I would act back to talk somebody.

I was good, so no problem. Okay. All right. I got nothing else. All right. All right. I sure appreciate it. Sure.

Asphalt hunters. So we're going to have the, we'll have the links in the description for Amazon. And I think that's pretty much it. Cool. All right. If you like the video, do me a favor and hit the like button. Subscribe to the channel. Leave a comment in the comment section and share the video to as many of your friends and family as you can think of.

And I appreciate it. See you.