bonding companies.
Joe Bob always gets rave reviews.
When I was young, my parents had a small commer-
cial printing business and they’d go out of town and leave
us in charge. More than once, a pressman would wind
up in jail when my parents were out of town. I always
counted on Joe Bob and his merry band of bail bondsmen
to bail them out. They were always kind and gracious to
the guys.
Joe Bob has been in the business for 50 years.
The question is, “How did Joe Bob get to be, well, er
ah Joe Bob?”
“You’ve got to work long, hard hours, and treat
people like they’re human beings. Treat them right.
You’re not their judge or jury,” he said.
There must be some times when a bondsman encoun-
ters someone that’s pure evil, a real-life Hannibal Lecter?
How do you deal with that?
“There are those cases,” Joe Bob said. “Still, I’m not
the one who makes that call. It’s not my place to judge
them. I’m not there to pronounce them guilty. Being non-
judgmental with your customers goes with the business of
making bonds.”
Over his half-a-century in business, Joe Bob has
branded himself as the family bail bondsman of numer-
ous Parker County dynasties. He takes pride in that and
rightly so. “I’ve created a longevity of great grandsons,
and grandsons, and granddaughters, and children for the
last 40 years,” he said. “It’s been a lot of repeat business
because of the way I handle my clients. I’ll get up at 3
o’clock in the morning and go down to make a bond. I’ve
always had an office across the street from the jail, and
it’s been very helpful to have that location. But, that’s not
most of it. It’s treating people as they should be treated,
although they’ve gotten into a little trouble, a little mess,
you still treat your clients with dignity.”
Beginnings
Joe Bob decided to go into the bail bonding business
when he was working as a Parker County Jailer. “I’d just
gotten out of the Army,” he said. “I went to work for
Sheriff John Young.” While making $300 a week, he was
at the jail. “I was bringing a prisoner in. This guy walked
in, wearing a pair of alligator shoes, and a shark skin suit.
I found out he was a bail bondsman, he’d posted this
guy’s bond and he made $500 on it. I scratched my head
and I said ‘I might be in the wrong profession.’”
Joe Bob left the Parker County Sheriff’s Department
for a job as a car salesman at a Ford dealership in the
Metroplex. “Couple years of working for the dealership, I
talked to my boss about backing me in the bonding busi-
ness, and he did,” Joe Bob said.
Eventually, he bought out his investor.
“I got out on my own,” he said. He never looked
back.
“It changes every day,” he said. “There’s nothing
routine, and I like that. There’s something new and excit-
ing …, always different situations.”
TERESA PLUMLEE- SURETY LIC # 0798PR4
24 HOUR SERVICE
Felonies • Misdemeanors
Se Hable Español
Brazos Bail Bonding Co
817-599-5311
126 Hogle Street
Weatherford, Tx
Joe Bob Plumlee
WE WILL GET YOUR LOVED ONE OUT OF JAIL FAST
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