Bail bond companies that pledged bail money as guarantees that their clients would appear for criminal court proceedings now owe the state more than $2.4 million in forfeited bail bonds after the offenders failed to show up for their court dates, according to data provided by the Hawaii State Judiciary.

Data provided in response to a public records request by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser show the Judiciary is owed money by companies doing business under three dozen names for bond forfeitures that in some cases date back to 2001 and 2002.

The list of unpaid bail forfeitures in Family, District and Circuit courts was compiled as of June 30 and includes amounts ranging from as little as $100 to as much as $250,000 in one case.

A spokeswoman for the Judiciary said the courts system is collaborating with other agencies to collect what is owed, and “we intend to continue improving our practices to collect outstanding debts.”

“I think we recognize there is a need for improvement in our collections system, and we have made improvement in the past year,” said Judiciary spokeswoman Tammy Mori. Those improvements include using the state attorney general’s office as the lead agency in pursuing unpaid bail forfeitures, she said.

Attorney General Douglas Chin announced on July 13 his office had filed court petitions to try to collect $35,500 owed for forfeitures on bonds backed by Da Kine Bail Bonds Inc. and Safety National Casualty Corp. Duane “Dog” Chapman, a reality television star in the program “Dog the Bounty Hunter,” is president and director of Da Kine Bail Bonds.

Chin said in his July 13 written announcement that his office has been working with the Judiciary to recover other unpaid bond amounts, and since 2013 has collected an additional $700,000 owed by seven other companies for bail forfeitures.

The courts system has also contracted with a collections agency called the Municipal Services Bureau to help collect money owed by the bail bond companies, according to Mori.

Beth Chapman, who is Duane Chapman’s wife and surety agent for Da Kine Bail Bonds, said the company has a very good record of paying what it owes.

“They have gone back 11 years, so it is very possible that things slipped through the cracks, but … I’ve written about $50 million worth of bail here in Hawaii, so if all I lost the state was $20,000, I still think I’ve got a good batting average,” she said.

The attorney general’s office is trying to collect on forfeited Da Kine Bail Bonds in cases that date back to 2004 and 2005, according to court filings. Howard Glickstein, lawyer for the Chapmans, said that is a “very long time for people who run businesses and who don’t keep files for 10 years.”

In the past, Glickstein said he was able to demonstrate that the state failed to follow proper procedures in attempting to collect bail forfeitures, and “the money that they say is owing is often not owing. What we’re doing now with them is trying to cooperatively go through each one of the cases.”

Beth Chapman said the attorney general “might be right” that Da Kine owes the state about $20,000 in overdue forfeitures, but “there has to be parameters and there has to be rules, not for just us, but also the court,” she said. “The AG going back 10 years, I don’t know where they get to do that.”

“Really, Duane and I want to set an example, so … when we get to the end of our negotiations, whatever that dollar amount is, is what it’s going to be and we’re going to pay it because we want everyone else to pay,” she said. “If they owe it, they need to pay it, and if they can’t pay it, they shouldn’t be writing any more bonds.”

The records released by the Judiciary list 61 forfeited bail bonds for Da Kine Bail Bonds worth $95,350, but the July court filings by the state are seeking only a fraction of that money.

Bail amounts are set in criminal cases to try to ensure that defendants will appear for their court dates in those cases, and bail may be required before a prisoner can be released from the custody of police or corrections officials.

People who are arrested and cannot pay their bail may use bail bond agents to win their release. Bail bondsmen charge the defendants a fee — often 10 percent of the bail amount — and in exchange the bond agent posts a bail bond and acts as a guarantor on the bail. When defendants fail to show up in court, the judge may order that the bail bond agent forfeit the full amount of the bail to the state.

At that point the bond agent is required to pay the bail amount to the state, but that hasn’t always happened, according to the Judiciary. The data released by the Judiciary listed 1,391 forfeited bail bonds that were uncollected as of June 30.

According to the records provided by the Judiciary, the largest single uncollected forfeited bail involved Joseph Vaimili, a violent pimp who was charged in 2009 with kidnapping, first-degree terroristic threatening, first-degree promoting prostitution, and use of a firearm in the commission of a felony.

Vaimili’s $250,000 bail was posted by Freedom Bail Bonds, but he fled the state on the day the jury was to be sworn in for his trial. When Vaimili couldn’t be found, the court continued the trial without him, and the jury convicted him on all counts.

He was later captured by U.S. marshals in Houston, and was returned to Hawaii where he was sentenced to 40 years in prison.

The Judiciary’s list of uncollected forfeited bail bonds includes 103 unpaid amounts for Freedom Bail Bonds totalling $572,075, which includes the Vaimili case. Mori said in a written statement that the Vaimili case is among a number of uncollected forfeitures that have been sent to the attorney general’s office, but “we cannot comment on any specific cases pending investigation.”

The state Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, which regulates bail agents, revoked the license of Ida Pearson Peppers, doing business as Freedom Bail Bonds, in 2014. According to DCCA, the department took action against Peppers after Peppers exhausted the appeals process for a forfeited bond, but still did not pay, according to the department.

She was also fined $25,000 in 2014 for breaching the terms of her license, but the department has not yet been able to collect the fine from Peppers, according to William Nhieu, spokesman for DCCA.

Nhieu said the department also revoked the licenses of bail agents Janis Fernandez, doing business as Exodus Bail Bonds, and Frank Fernandez, although those decisions are being appealed to Circuit Court. Exodus is not allowed to post bail bonds pending the outcome of the appeal, but the Judiciary reported Exodus still owes more than $99,000 in unpaid forfeited bail bonds.

Nhieu said in a written statement that the DCCA’s Insurance Division “is investigating other wrongdoings by other bail agents and sureties in this area.”

However, he said enforcement actions in bail cases are sometimes delayed when the bail companies appeal the court-ordered bail forfeitures. “These appeals preclude the division from immediately pursuing administrative actions against bail agents and sureties,” Nhieu said.

The problem of bail bond agents who fail to pay up has been an issue since at least 1984, when the issue was raised by the Hawaii Crime Commission in a report entitled “Study of Bail Forfeitures in Hawaii.”

The 1984 report cited 22 cases where forfeited bonds were not paid even after “extensive delays,” and described the issue of unpaid forfeitures as “perhaps the most disturbing problem, and certainly the most costly one” that was revealed by the study.

Beth Chapman is also president of the Professional Bail Agents of the United States, and said she has lobbied at the state level for years for reforms in Hawaii’s bail system to establish “a uniform playing field for everyone.”

Chapman said the state needs to promptly send bail agents a forfeiture notice when defendants fail to appear in court, and should bar bail agents from posting any additional bail bonds until they either find the missing defendants, or pay the forfeited bail amounts. That isn’t happening, she said.

She also said the DCCA should be using its licensing authority over bail agents more aggressively to pressure them to pay what they owe.