[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 19 (Tuesday, March 3, 1998)]
[House]
[Page H702]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        CITIZENS PROTECTION ACT

  (Mr. HUTCHINSON asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. Speaker, in 1995 a bounty hunter was chasing a 
bond jumper in Texas. In Houston, he found a woman he thought to be the 
bond jumper and beat her severely. The woman, who was pregnant, 
miscarried the next day. The key fact was the bounty hunter had the 
wrong woman. An innocent woman lost her child at the hands of a rogue 
bounty hunter.
  The majority of bounty hunters are professionals who do excellent 
work. Unfortunately, there are a few Dirty Harry wannabes out there as 
well, and the results can be tragic.
  I urge my colleagues to support the Citizens Protection Act, a bill 
which provides an incentive to weed out the rogue bounty hunters and 
prevent this kind of reckless abuse that resulted in the death of that 
mother's child.
  The Citizens Protection Act holds two things: It says that bounty 
hunters and their employers, bail bondsmen, are accountable for their 
actions, making them liable for civil rights actions. The second thing 
it does, it requires bounty hunters who cross State lines in pursuit of 
a bond jumper to report their intentions to State law enforcement 
authorities.
  A bounty hunter's license, Mr. Speaker, should not be a license to 
terrorize and abuse innocent citizens, and I urge my colleagues to 
support the Citizens Protection Act.

                          ____________________