Unusual Professions: How Russian Worked as a Bounty Hunter in the USA

“Headhunters” are iconic characters in American Westerns and frequent characters on television shows. Their job is to catch those who have escaped justice for a reward. Despite all the controversy surrounding the practice, this institution, which formed in insular England during the 18th century, is still legal in 46 of the 50 American states. For the majority of Russian-speaking immigrants, the phrase “headhunter” evokes, first of all, associations with adventure novels: in their homeland there is simply no such profession, and people often do not realize that it exists not only in the fictional artistic world. In reality, almost anyone can become a bounty hunter, and often all it takes is a short course, especially since only 22 states require licensing. Especially for ForumDaily businessman Alexander (the name was changed at the request of the hero - approx. ed.), which 5 spent years hunting for criminals in New Jersey and Connecticut, told how he worked as a headhunter, and what came of it.

Фото: Depositphotos

Start: Chasing Adrenaline

I learned about the existence of this profession from a television show. Then I already had a small bright office with my table and computer. I lived a measured life of a normal American: everything was fine, but very boring. I wanted to drive and adrenaline, and I immediately caught fire with a new idea.

Soon I entered two-month courses. Classes were divided into two parts: theory and physical training.

As a rule, bounty hunters deal with offenses of the same type: the person was released on bail, but for some reason did not appear in court. It can be both criminal and administrative matters.

During the courses we were told in detail what we are entitled to and what we are not. For example, the discovery was that we can only use our own physical strength and a gas canister. Firearms are excluded. Otherwise, the victim or his family has the right to demand reimbursement of treatment costs through the court. As a master of sports in shooting, this surprised me. Moreover, the same consequences will happen, say, if I take an ordinary stick and use this stick to beat the person I’m trying to detain.

The only thing we use when making arrests is gentle physical pressure and, believe it or not, a kind word. There are certain phrases that allow you to psychologically process a person, but there are no universal recipes: everyone has their own hook to hook on.

But the bounty hunters themselves have no compensation for injuries or death. Everything is done at your own peril and risk, because they are all completely private individuals. However, there is always an element of insurance: according to the rules, before the operation, I must notify the local police station, and by the time the “ward” was discovered, there were usually law enforcement officers nearby.

The benefit for the American law enforcement system from the services of bounty hunters is that the police simply do not waste time on this, because first of all, this is the analytical work of a detective: before catching fugitives, they first need to be found.

Work: Theory and Practice

Bounty hunting is an established private business. When I graduated from school, it was completely unclear how to look for a job. Nobody taught us this. The fact is that bounty hunters work through bailmen - people appointed by the court and issuing an arrest warrant. The longer you are in the profession, the more bailers you know and the more expensive the orders. I didn’t have any personal contacts after finishing the course, but I was lucky: the teacher helped.

Bounty hunters never go on a mission alone - it's always a team effort. As a rule, the group includes at least three people. Depending on the complexity of the task, responsibilities are distributed between them: who stands where, who does what. I ended up in one of these groups.

Фото: Depositphotos

I remember my feelings from the first task very well. Everything happened so quickly that I did not have time to understand what happened. I was a newbie, and I was given the least dangerous position during the arrest: I was guarding the emergency exit (as it turned out later, there were two of them). And then - bam! - and the man in handcuffs is already sitting in our car. He was a 25-year-old African-American boy, almost two meters tall. It turned out that the group leader found the right words - and the detainee voluntarily surrendered. This shocked me to the core: I got money quickly without doing anything. I was both pleased and annoyed at the same time.

Even if bounty hunting is not your main career, it can be quite lucrative. The cost of an order starts from 200-500 dollars, but the average fee is usually higher - 2,5-5 thousand dollars. This money is divided among team members by agreement, but, as a rule, equally, because - no matter how pompous it may sound - everyone takes risks in their own way.

In a month I had from three to ten tasks. We were paid mainly by checks or cash. I did not think about how to make these incomes in the tax return. The amounts I have always been small compared with the main office work, which I never threw.

When I started working, I was struck by how practical the theory was. While on assignment, I often simply could not believe my eyes: people made the very textbook errors that we were warned about in the courses, and the consequences were exactly what the instructor described them.

Very often, excessive self-confidence leads to such textbook mistakes. At the beginning of my career, I considered myself the smartest and coolest. One day I decided that I could persuade a person to come with us without even reading the file on him. And so I walk into the bar, see a young African-American man behind the bar, calmly show him the arrest warrant and offer him to surrender. “Come on, try to force me,” this boy suddenly says and gets up. It turns out that I am up to his chest. The forces were clearly not equal. The boy started a fight and tried to kick me out of the bar. This is where my knowledge of martial arts came in handy. The rest of the group, disappeared into the crowd, covered me. All this came as a big surprise to me. If I had read the file, I would have known that this man's previous arrests followed a similar pattern, and we could have mitigated the risks during the operation.

It happens, of course, when everyone makes mistakes at once, and this can cost the lives of team members. Once we were chasing a man down the street, and we all forgot to think that our “ward” might have friends. There were five of us, seven of them. A fight broke out. The person who was supposed to call the police got caught up in the fight and couldn't get his phone. At this time, one of our “ward’s” friends opened fire. He managed to fire two shots, and one of the bullets hit me. I was lucky: the leader of the group was an experienced bounty hunter, and before the mission he made us all put on body armor. And by the way, I also resisted this: they say that the body armor hinders my actions, I cannot run and jump quickly, but my senior colleague was persistent, and in the end his persistence saved me. However, before the police arrived, they managed to beat us thoroughly.

Фото: Depositphotos

About colleagues and women in the profession

People who come to this profession are crazy in a good sense of the word. They just can not sit quietly on the spot, sorting out papers. Like me, many of my colleagues had a normal office job. For example, I often met lawyers. They caught runaway criminals in their free time in the evenings. I think it was a kind of psychological relief for them.

Basically, of course, men are engaged in such work, because it is dangerous. But there are more women in this business than it might seem at first glance. In the courses where I studied, they were 8 in a group of 40 people.

However, I have never had the opportunity to work with women, but I can imagine that in some cases they can significantly simplify the task. For example, a woman is an ideal bait for a “ward” who needs to be taken out of a bar. Men are still animals, and in the presence of a woman they quickly lose their vigilance. But the bounty hunter’s functions are not limited to these functions. Many of them are engaged in the return of stolen cars, and this is a separate specialization. To be honest, some adhere to such a style of work that one cannot dare to call them women in the usual sense of the word.

When I enrolled in courses, my sister also became interested in this profession, but my parents became hysterical, and I decided to stop her. I told my sister to continue to study with her college, and I, supposedly, until I found out everything myself, and with time her enthusiasm faded away.

The end of the bounty hunter's career

In total, I lasted in this profession for about five years, from 2002 to 2007. I worked primarily in New Jersey and Connecticut. In New York, the activities of bounty hunters are prohibited - sheriffs catch fugitive criminals.

I left for personal reasons. I had a girlfriend who was very worried about me and was endlessly hysterical, and at some point I gave up. I concentrated exclusively on my office work. That girl thought it was better for me. If it were not for her, I, perhaps, would still have been a bounty hunter.

I did not sign any formal letter of resignation. In this case, at least in my time, even the employment procedure was not. Just familiar ballers called me and offered to take the case, but at some point I started to say that I was busy, and gradually the flow of proposals came to naught.

Now my activities are not connected with the police or the law enforcement system as a whole - I am engaged in business in the field of transport transportation. But I think that being a headhunter taught me how to communicate more effectively with people, and this makes it easier for me to achieve my goals. Any experience is an experience.

I am not a member of any professional associations of former bounty hunters, but I remained on good terms with all my colleagues. We can meet friends in a bar and talk about life. We do not discuss their tasks. When I see a friend balesman on the street, I always greet him. In response, the question usually arises: “So what? Not boring? Do you want to return? ”. And I answer: “No, I don’t want it anymore, I have burned out”.

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