4 Florida Keys bail bondsmen arrested on kidnapping, extortion charges: officials
Three years ago, three bail bondsmen based in Key Largo took it upon themselves to enter a residence in Miami-Dade County. They began the search by breaking through a locked gate, forcibly opening the door, then handcuffing a man and driving him down to the Keys to be arrested on a warrant for failing to appear in court, according to police.
The raid on Jan. 11, 2022, prompted an investigation that ended with the bail bondsmen, along with one of their colleagues, arrested this week on charges ranging from armed kidnapping to fraud, court documents reveal.
When Alexander Rispa, Eduardo Caceras and Luis Hernandez Salas retrieved the man, Rispa was wearing a tactical vest with an “Agent” patch on it, a badge and carrying an exposed sidearm — all illegal for bail bondsmen, according to a probable cause affidavit from both the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the Florida Department of Financial Services’ Criminal Investigations Division.
Investigators also say the company that posted the bond for the man to get out of Monroe County jail never assigned the purpo to track him down.
The three men, who have bonded out of jail, are facing armed kidnapping and battery charges in Monroe County over the incident.
They work for Paradise Bail Bonds in Key Largo, which is owned by Hernandez Salas, 34, according to state records.
The joint FDLE and Division of Financial Services investigations also found several other instances in which employees of Paradise Bail Bonds broke the law, according to the probable cause affidavit.
Juan Carlos Soto Arraga, 30 — who is Hernandez Salas’ brother-in-law — is accused on five occasions in 2023 and 2024 of negotiating bond payments, terms and conditions with Monroe County jail inmates “for financial gain” without being a licensed and qualified bond agent, according to the affidavit.
Soto Arraga was also arrested this week and has been released from jail.
Details of all four men’s release were not immediately availabe. Paradise Bail Bonds did not respond to the Herald’s request for comment, nor have attorneys for Rispa, 43, and Soto Arraga. Information on legal representation for Caceras, 47, and Hernandez Salas was not immediately available.
Extorted a couple arrested in the Keys?
Rispa and Soto Arraga also have a pending criminal case in Miami-Dade County for extortion and scheming to defraud, also as representatives of Paradise Bail Bonds.
According to arrest paperwork, they bailed out a Miami-Dade couple who were arrested in the Florida Keys over the July 4 weekend. Their first phone call was to the mother of the boyfriend, who contacted a bail bonds company to get them out of jail, according to the arrest report.
However, when they were released, the mother of the girlfriend told them that Paradise Bail Bonds called her and said they bailed the couple out of jail. But there was one caveat: they needed to pay the company and sign a contract, per the report.
The couple called Paradise Bail Bonds and informed them that they never consented for them to pay their bail. Over the next several days, Rispa and Soto Arraga repeatedly called them threatening to revoke their bond and take them back to jail if they didn’t pay, according to the arrest report.
‘You must be new here’
Rispa also has another pending case in the Keys related to his bail bondsman occupation — this time for unlawful use of a badge or indica of authority.
On Oct. 26, 2024, a Florida Highway Patrol trooper pulled over Rispa, who was driving his Toyota Tacoma pickup truck at mile marker 90 on U.S. 1 in Islamorada. The trooper said in his report that the reason for stopping Rispa was that the tint on the truck’s windows was too dark.
When Rispa rolled down his window, he was wearing a six-sided silver badge with the word “Agent” displayed, according to the report. When the trooper told him why he pulled him over, Rispa grabbed his badge responed, “Ahh, come on man,” the report stated.
He told the trooper he was law enforcement, to which the trooper responded he wasn’t, according to the report. He then showed his bail bondsman license as proof he was in fact law enforcement. The trooper told him that in Florida, that license is “similar to a real estate license, in the aspect of that it does not grant law enforcement powers.”
The trooper noted in his report that he pulled over Rispa a year earlier, and again, he tried using his badge to excuse his window tint. According to the report, he also told the trooper, “You must be new here.”
This story was originally published September 19, 2025 at 7:00 AM.
