YOLO, Calif. — A judge sharply raised bail for a non-English-speaking accused during a bail review hearing Monday in Yolo County Superior Court, increasing the amount from $10,000 to $50,000 in a disputed case alleging fraud across multiple counties, including Yolo and Stanislaus. The defense argued the increase lacked a sufficient factual basis and rested on the court’s recollection rather than evidence presented on the record.
During the review, the court said the accused allegedly participated in a fraudulent scheme that would extort funding from elderly individuals — “the most vulnerable in our community,” as Judge Danette C. Brown put it — in the Yolo region.
The court provided a Mandarin translator to assist the accused. She translated statements from Deputy District Attorney Alvina Tzang, who described the accused as being “involved in an alleged scheme to defraud individuals in accounting.”
According to the SOR (supervised own recognizance) report, the accused was living as a transient in Union City and had no established ties to the Yolo County community. The accused reportedly worked as a delivery driver despite not holding a California driver’s license and allegedly collected $140,000 from individuals.
Judge Danette C. Brown said, “My understanding is that another judge had signed bail at $150,000, but it was later reduced to $10,000. I am not certain whether this reduction deviated from the standard bail schedule.”
Judge Brown also stated, “The court has no recollection of why bail was reduced to $10,000.” The court noted the earlier reduction in bail may have been due to financial considerations.
The deputy public defender said, “Whether it is $10,000, $50,000, or $1 million, there is no real difference.” He added that the accused was allegedly part of a scheme to defraud individuals of $140,000, saying, “I would assume he did not keep the money. He’s reported to be a transient delivery driver, and he does not have the language skills to even accomplish this elaborate fraud scheme.”
The deputy public defender continued, noting that even if the charges are true, “and he was the one who picked up the cash, … we probably got the lowest man on the totem pole in that fraud scheme.”
The deputy public defender argued the court did not have information suggesting the accused had violated court orders in the past, pointing out that Stanislaus County had already released him on probation to indicate that “at least there they thought he could follow some conditions of probation.”
The court found the two reasons for government interest — the safety of the victim and the public at large, and the lack of assurance that the accused would appear in court — provided clear and convincing evidence that no conditions short of detention could assure public safety or guarantee his return to court in Yolo County.
The court denied release on own recognizance, subject to the terms and conditions of Stanislaus probation, and set bail at $50,000, to which the public defender objected, claiming a lack of legal basis.
“There have to be facts that the court did not know before to use those facts to adjust that bail amount,” he said, adding that the prosecution did not present “any facts today that they hadn’t before to justify the upward adjustment for the bail amount.”
He continued to argue that not specifically knowing the reasoning for the previously set bail amount “does not necessarily justify the court going back and increasing the bail amount just because we asked for SOR release or OR release.”
Despite arguments from the prosecution, Judge Brown decided to leave bail at $10,000. The bail amount and release decisions may still be reviewed at and after the preliminary hearing. Ultimately, the court denied the accused’s request “without prejudice” for pretrial release, allowing the matter to be revisited Jan. 22.
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