NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — What happened in the Cordell Hull building Tuesday morning mirrored much of what we saw in the four-hour court hearing just down the road earlier this summer.
This time instead of a six-judge panel asking questions, we heard from Tennessee lawmakers who were just as confused by how many things went wrong with Bricen Rivers’ release.
Rivers bonded out of a Nashville jail in June after spending several months behind bars for allegedly assaulting his girlfriend, Lauren Johansen.
The pair were visiting from Mississippi at the time.
Rivers was then placed on GPS monitoring through Freedom Monitoring, but just days later, was charged with Johansen’s murder across state lines.
He currently sits in a Mississippi jail waiting for his next court hearing, but state leaders are now considering what if any changes they can make to avoid these tragedies in the future.
The Senate Bail Task Force heard testimony on Tuesday from bond companies, GPS monitoring companies, as well as people from several adjacent industries in Tennessee.
Questions ranged from explaining the basics of what they do to what actions they take if a defendant violates their bond conditions.
Leslie Anderson of GPS monitoring company A2i shared the background information of how the industry works and said that typically these devices are installed in jail, right before a defendant is released.
Anderson operates out of several states and told lawmakers that there were specific rules in those states around expectations for GPS monitoring.
Some of these same lawmakers were present in court when the six-judge panel heard what they later called “a calamity of human and institutional errors” that may have contributed to this tragedy.
The courts found that neither Brooke's Bail Bonding or On Time Bonding violated any local rules with how they bonded Rivers out of jail, but the panel detailed nine areas of concern including an “inherent conflict of interest” for a bonding agent to also operate as a GPS monitoring company under the same roof.
Nakeda Wilhoite owns Freedom Monitoring and told the courts that she was working in her capacity as a monitoring company, not as a bond agent for Brooke’s Bail Bonding, when she convinced Rivers to come back to Nashville.
Rivers had already violated his bond conditions by leaving the state, but Wilhoite said she wasn’t aware of his conditions at that time.
She said she finally learned of the bond conditions the day before Rivers returned to Nashville, but she never contacted law enforcement or surrendered Rivers to jail because she wasn’t sure she had the authority.
NewsChannel 5 Investigates later discovered that Wilhoite was also operating a bond company out of a different county, while also working as a caseworker for the Department of Children Services.
Lawmakers didn't address Wilhoite juggling other jobs, but Sen. John Stevens, R-Huntingdon, was among the first to share his frustration after hearing about Wilhoite’s testimony.
“I’m still just dumbfounded by testifying in open court that it’s the first time you’d ever realized you might have a conflict. It’s dumbfounding,” Stevens said.
Ken Holmes is the president of the Tennessee Bonding Company and testified Tuesday that this is a perfect example of why a state agency, instead of the courts, could do a better job regulating the GPS monitoring so rules are consistent between counties.
He argued how standardized practices through an agency like the Tennessee Department of Commerce and Insurance would allow for statewide transparency, “so what’s legal in Knoxville, would be legal in Nashville, which right now is not the same.”
Sen. Ferrell Haile, R-Gallatin, warned of a possible conflict in the state code about what responsibilities are usually left to the court and ended by saying it’s a very complex issue.
Attorney Joel Moseley with the Tennessee Association of Professional Bail Agents said it’s best to leave this in the hands of the courts in each county.
“Local control provides that fine-tuning. That ability to tweak things to address the concerns that are of particular interest to let’s say Hamilton County or Davidson County — that aren’t shared by Perry County or Maury County — that is a benefit, not a detriment to the system,” said Moseley.
Stevens responded by saying he’s inclined to consider a statewide regulatory board if it means easing the burden on judges, making the rules easier to understand and potentially saving lives in the process.
“They were all aware by the time that there’s been a violation, yet nobody turned them in at that point and that is extremely concerning because the whole point of the legislation was public safety and someone violated the public trust by not being a good actor. They put their self-interest ahead of the public interest. I think at that point where you may say judges are the appropriate persons to monitor this, I strongly disagree,” Stevens said.
Stevens ended by saying he believes the focus should stay on monitoring companies that at this point, don’t have much oversight by the state.
“I don’t believe that the courts are the proper place to do that. I think we need to figure out a way to make monitoring agencies are actually monitoring and when there are violations, law enforcement is notified and notified immediately,” Stevens said.
Moseley responded by saying the only potential conflict of interest they saw in this case had to do with a financial conflict on Wilhoite’s part.
He argued that GPS monitoring companies are incentivized to keep people out of jail because defendants pay them for every day they’re on the monitor.
“That might be something the panel needs to look at, is whether or not it would be in the public interest to have a situation where if a defendant has violated the terms and conditions of their release, then that monitoring company is not entitled to a single dime,” Moseley said.
Bill Nolan, who also represents the Tennessee Association of Professional Bail Agents, offered context by saying that five years ago, his industry did not want to get involved with GPS monitoring to begin with.
He now went as far as apologizing to lawmakers for stepping too far back.
“We have a lot of things that we look at, and I apologize for this industry not paying more attention to our sister industry, but there’s an inherent conflict when a bail agent has a monitoring company. I’ll probably be fired for saying all this,” Nolan said.
Nolan told lawmakers that just this past week, members of his industry were taking a closer look at GPS monitoring and any recommendations they can make to the general assembly next session.
Other policy considerations involved changing a previously passed law where it was mandatory to enter warrant information into the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) database, within 10 business days after a defendant fails to appear in court or violates their bond conditions.
The law had previously said warrants had to be entered within 10 days.
Shelly Alexander of the Tennessee Association of Professional Bail Agents said while she can’t speculate on if creating a greater sense of urgency to have these warrants in NCIC would have saved Johansen, she believes it could save others.
Lawmakers did not vote on any changes but say they plan to carry some of these concerns into session for more discussion and possible legislation.
