(a) No person, firm or corporation or any officer or employee thereof shall act in this state as an agent or solicitor of an insurer or charitable bail organization doing a bail business in soliciting, negotiating or effectuating any such deposit or bail bond by such insurer or charitable bail organization unless licensed by the superintendent as an agent pursuant to the provisions of this section. Any person, firm or corporation so acting without being duly licensed shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.
(b) Every corporation or charitable bail organization engaging as an insurer doing a bail business in this state shall procure a license pursuant to the provisions of this section for each of its employees, officers and agents acting for it in soliciting, negotiating or effectuating any such deposit or bail bond.
(c) The superintendent may, in the superintendent's discretion, issue to any person, firm or corporation a license to act as an agent of an authorized insurer or charitable bail organization, in soliciting, negotiating or effectuating any such deposit or bail bond by such insurer or any such deposit by such charitable bail organization.
(d) Any such license issued to a firm or corporation shall authorize only the members named in such license as sublicensees, to act individually as agents thereunder. Any sublicense issued to a corporation shall authorize only the officers and directors named in such license as sublicensees, to act individually as agents thereunder. Every sublicensee, acting as insurance agent pursuant to a license issued to a firm or corporation, shall be authorized to act only in the name of such firm or corporation.
(e) Before the issuance of a license every applicant shall satisfy the superintendent as to his trustworthiness and competence and otherwise comply with the conditions set forth in this section. The superintendent may refuse to issue any such license if in his judgment such refusal will best promote the interests of the people of this state.
(f) At the time of the application for every license a twenty-five dollar fee shall be paid to the superintendent for each year or fraction of a year in which a license shall be valid for each individual applicant and for each proposed sublicensee.
(g) Every applicant for a license hereunder shall file with the superintendent written evidence by those who know his character and reputation and by such other proof as the superintendent may require, including his fingerprints, that he is a person of good character and reputation and has never been convicted of any offense involving moral turpitude or of any crime. If such applicant is a firm or corporation such proof must be made with respect to every member, shareholder, officer and director of such firm or corporation. Such fingerprints shall be submitted to the division of criminal justice services for a state criminal history record check, as defined in subdivision one of section three thousand thirty-five of the education law, and may be submitted to the federal bureau of investigation for a national criminal history record check.
(h) In order to determine the competence of each applicant for a license or a sublicense, the superintendent shall require every applicant to pass to the satisfaction of the superintendent a written examination to be prepared by the superintendent and appropriate to the doing of a bail business. If the applicant or any proposed sublicensee intends to maintain an office or solicit, negotiate, effectuate or deposit bail on behalf of another in any city containing a population of more than one hundred seventy-five thousand, such written examination may inquire into the applicant's knowledge of the pertinent provisions of the criminal procedure law and the pertinent rules and practices of the courts and district attorneys' offices within the area of the applicant's proposed operations. Such examination shall be held at such times and places as the superintendent shall determine.
(i) Every individual applying to take any written examination shall at the time of applying pay to the superintendent, or at the discretion of the superintendent, directly to any organization that is under contract to provide examination services, an examination fee of an amount which is the actual documented administrative cost of conducting the examination as certified by the superintendent from time to time. An examination fee represents an administrative expense and is not refundable.
(j) Every applicant for any such license shall file with the superintendent a qualifying bond, approved by the attorney general as to form and by the superintendent as to sufficiency, in a penalty of five thousand dollars, conditioned upon the faithful performance of the duties of such licensee. No such qualifying bond shall be subject to termination or cancellation by either party in less than sixty days after the giving of written notice to the other party and to the superintenden