Los Angeles Bail Bonds …just another day

In County of Los Angeles v. American Contractors Indemnity Co. , 2010 WL 2373364 (Cal.App. June 15, 2010) the defendant repeatedly failed to appear, but his counsel represented that the defendant had health problems.  Eventually the court declared a forfeiture and entered summary judgment on the bond.  The surety moved to set aside the summary judgment and exonerate the bond.  The court denied the motion 126 days after the motion was filed, and the surety appealed.  The appeal was filed 175 days after notice of entry of the summary judgment.  The Court dismissed the appeal as untimely.  The surety argued that the trial court lost jurisdiction when it failed to forfeit the bond when the defendant first failed to appear without sufficient excuse.  The Court held that the trial court had fundamental jurisdiction and may only have acted in excess of its jurisdiction.  Therefore, the summary judgment became final when the appeal period expired, and it was not subject to collateral attack by the surety’s motion to set it aside.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 25th, 2010 at 12:44 pm and is filed under Bail Laws. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.