Mark Sievers requests $4.43 million bond to be reduced

FORT MYERS, Fla. – Mark Sievers, charged with second-degree murder in the death of his wife, has requested his bond to be reduced to $250,000.

Sievers listed having “limited to no financial resources,” his two children and his mother who live in the area, and his inability to collect on any insurance policies or use his Bonita Springs home as collateral unless he’s acquitted, among reasons for a bond reduction, according to court documents filed Tuesday.

“There is no likelihood that the defendant will intimidate any witness upon release from custody,” Sievers’ attorneys with the Faga Law Group wrote in court documents. “The defendant stayed in Southwest Florida pending the entire investigation and, further, has no prior conduct that would lead this honorable court to conclude that the defendant is a flight risk.”

Sievers, 47, is currently in the Lee County jail on a $4.43 million bond.

His bond was based on the total amount of the insurance policies he and his wife, Dr. Teresa Sievers, had together.

“The bail determination is not a method by which an accused may be anticipatory punished,” the attorneys wrote. “The bail amount must be reasonable as an excessively high bond is tantamount to no bond.”

Basing the bond amount on the belief that Mark Sievers would use the life insurance policies to cover it is a “legal impossibility,” as state law prevents such from happening unless he’s acquitted, the attorneys wrote. In addition, Teresa Sievers’ estate cannot be settled until the murder case is disposed, they said.

“The court must consider the factors set forth in (state statute) in setting a reasonable bond,” the attorneys wrote.

Teresa Sievers was found bludgeoned to death inside the kitchen of the couple’s Jarvis Road home in June 2015.

Mark Sievers entered a not guilty plea earlier this month. His childhood friend, Curtis Wayne Wright, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder as part of a plea agreement and is expected to testify against Mark Sievers and Jimmy Ray Rodgers, who is also charged with second-degree murder in the alleged murder-for-hire plot.