Shawn Weaver, right, and his son, Jamie Weaver, look over a warrant for a fugitive they were hunting in Saks last week. (Anniston Star photo by Stephen Gross)
Not through punishment, but through apprehension — in both senses of the word.
That’s because Weaver, 40, goes off to work every day as a fugitive recovery agent, his goal being to capture, as peacefully as possible, men and women who forget that being “out on bail” implies that at some point, they have to show up again.
“The bad guys in Glen Addie and Blue Mountain know my truck,” he noted.
Such individuals are probably indeed worried that the law will catch up with them, and that’s where Weaver comes in — sometimes wearing a bulletproof vest, because getting shot at and stabbed are occupational hazards.
You might call Weaver a “bounty hunter.” He’s not really fond of that term, though, so since he’s 5-foot-11, weighs 240 pounds and knows martial arts, we will indeed call him a fugitive recovery agent.
A resident of the area since 1995, Weaver opened his business, Night Eye P.I. and Fugitive Recovery, LLC, a couple of years ago because he “got tired of traveling.” He’s been a recovery agent for longer than those two years, but previously he worked for someone else, he said.
Weaver is the muscle for bail bonding firms that might not have the resources at the moment to go out and find someone. His Anniston clients include Speedy Bail Bonds, Allen Mayfield, Acme Bonding and Abe’s Ace.
“If they can’t find ’em, they hire me, and I track ’em down to whatever part of the country I’ve got to go to,” Weaver said.
His pay includes the percentage of the bond that the suspect originally put up, e.g., $1,000 of a $10,000 bond. The incentive to the bonding company is clear, Weaver explained: If the company doesn’t pay him to go find someone, then it has to pay the full amount of the bond to the court in which the suspect was supposed to have appeared.
Federal and Alabama laws make it possible for him to do his job. As long as Weaver has a piece of paper from a bonding agent that says John Doe didn’t show up for his court date, Weaver can go wherever he needs to go, or enter any structure, to track John Doe down.
When it comes to capturing particular individuals, he said, “We’ve got more rights than the police officers do.”
Although Weaver is physically equipped to do his job — his 19-year-old son generally goes along with him, and other men are available in extreme cases — most of his work is by instinct and calculation.
“This is more of a mental game than anything,” he said, explaining that the hard part is locating someone in the first place.
“When you’ve got 30 stories, you’ve got to put them all together and see what’s right,” Weaver said. “The fight’s the easy part. The arguing’s the easy part. You just gotta outwit (the suspects), be smarter than they are.”
Weaver said most of his captures — about 70 percent, he estimated — are peaceful. He just has to be prepared for two things: double-talk and lies from the suspect and hassles from the person’s friends and relatives, if they happen to be at the site of the capture.
“I get more grief from the people around them than I do from the people I’m chasing,” he said.
Sometimes, though, it’s the suspect’s associates who make the collar possible.
For example, living in public housing and harboring a fugitive don’t go together, according to the rules, so anyone who tries that can usually be persuaded to “give up” whoever Weaver is looking for.
“It’s a mind game you just have to play,” he said.
Other relationships can also be exploited profitably.
“I love finding a girlfriend. The ex-wives and ex-girlfriends are the best because they’ll tell on you in a heartbeat,” said Weaver, who’s divorced.
Along those lines, he added, if a woman is the fugitive, his job can become tougher.
“Anybody that does this will tell you, the women are the worst. They played with Barbies (when they were girls). They don’t know the meaning of the word ‘give up.’”
Contact staff writer Bill Edwards at 256-235-3563.
