Re: States with non-extradition laws ?
Barry Gold
>I overheard someone mentioning that in the state of Oregon, non
>violent offenders could not be extradited to other states. Is this
>true? Ive never heard of anything like this; are there any other
>states that have this ?
I don't know about Oregon law. There is a general principle that
an accused person cannot be extradited for a _misdemeanor_(*). For
example, suppose you live in Oregon and go into California and steal
a cheap watch from somebody, then run back to Oregon. Meanwhile, the
victim manages to identify you (e.g., from a photograph). Oregon
doesn't have to (and probably won't) send you back to California to
stand trial.
You have to be careful, though, because a lot of things can raise a
crime from a misdemeanor to a felony. For example, if you grab a
wallet out of the victim's hand instead of from the table where he
set it down for a moment, that's robbery. And if you were holding a
knife or gun in your other hand, that's _armed_ robbery, which is
definitely a felony. (It's also possible that the cops might coach
the victim to _say_ you used a weapon, so they can swear out a felony
warrant and get you extradited.)
Also, even petty theft (stealing something under $500 in value) can
be promoted to a felony if you have a previous felony conviction.
The first use of California's "Three Strikes" law was to put away a
man who stole some pizza from a group of young teenagers. He just
grabbed it off the table -- but he had two previous felony
convictions, one for a violent crime, so the theft was automatically
promoted to a felony and he was eligible for 25 to life under CA's
Three Strikes law.
In summary, just don't go around stealing things, threatening people,
and suchlike, and you won't have to worry about it.
(*) In most states, a "misdemeanor" is any crime that is above a mere
"infraction" (traffic ticket) but carries a maximum penalty of less
than one year in prison (or sometimes a designated amount of fine).
Above one year, it is a "felony".
--
Barry Gold, webmaster:
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Conchord: http://www.conchord.org
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mike boersma
> I overheard someone mentioning that in the state of Oregon, non
> violent offenders could not be extradited to other states. Is this
> true?
Article IV of the US Constitution reads:
"A person charged in any state with treason, felony, or other crime,
who shall flee from justice, and be found in another state, shall on
demand of the executive authority of the state from which he fled, be
delivered up, to be removed to the state having jurisdiction of the
crime."
With this being said, warrants for arrest usually are entered into the
law enforcement information network (LEIN) with a radius for
extradition. A non-violent offense might have a radius of extradition
of 25 miles (the distance that the issuing jurisdiction will send law
enforcement to pick up the offender). Thus if someone is arrested on a
warrant where the issuing jurisdiction will not send for the offender,
then the arresting agency will usually tell the offender to clear up
the warrant and release the offender.
The Feds are not so constrained. There is no extradition requirement
for a Federal offender who commits an offense in Alaska and is
arrested in Washington, DC.
Stan Brown
> (*) In most states, a "misdemeanor" is any crime that is above a mere
> "infraction" (traffic ticket) but carries a maximum penalty of less
> than one year in prison (or sometimes a designated amount of fine).
> Above one year, it is a "felony".
More info:
In Ohio, a traffic ticket was a misdemeanor when I lived there
(through 1999). I was surprised by New York's three-level system,
though they're called "violations" rather than "infractions".
--
If you e-mail me from a fake address, your fingers will drop off.
I am not a lawyer; this is not legal advice. When you read anything
legal on the net, always verify it on your own, in light of your
particular circumstances. You may also need to consult a lawyer.
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
http://OakRoadSystems.com
Stan Brown
<mike.b...@gmail.com>:
> The Feds are not so constrained. There is no extradition requirement
> for a Federal offender who commits an offense in Alaska and is
> arrested in Washington, DC.
But if he's going to be tried, he must be tried in Alaska and
reasonably close to where the crime was committed. The Sixth
Amendment says "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy
the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the
State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed. ..."
I suppose the amendment *could* be satisfied by empaneling a jury of
Alaskans and transporting them to DC, but that seems unlikely as a
practical matter.
Mike
> Star_no_Star <amanda...@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> I overheard someone mentioning that in the state of Oregon, non
>> violent offenders could not be extradited to other states. Is this
>> states that have this ?
>
> who shall flee from Justice, and be found in another State, shall on
> Demand of the executive Authority of the State from which he fled, be
> delivered up, to be removed to the State having Jurisdiction of the
> Crime." -- US Costitution, article 4, section 2.
>
> There is no exception for nonviolent crimes.
The constitution seems to make a difference between "crimes" and
"misdemeanors", although common usage is that a crime can be either a
misdemeanor OR a felony. So the part that you quoted would seem to not
include something like disorderly conduct, even though if the average
Joe on the street were asked, he'd say that disorderly conduct, drunk in
public, possession of a joint, etc. were all crimes. So a "non violent
offender" could include someone who got caught with a joint (although
it'd also include someone caught with 20 tons of pot and I'm SURE that's
a felony in all states.)
The OP might be mistaken and the law might be that someone convicted of
a misdemeanor (or less) can't be extradited (and pretty much all
misdemeanors are non-violent) but all felons (violent or not) can be.
Cy Pres
wrote:
>Star_no_Star <amanda...@gmail.com> writes:
>>I overheard someone mentioning that in the state of Oregon, non
>>violent offenders could not be extradited to other states. Is this
>>true? Ive never heard of anything like this; are there any other
>>states that have this ?
>"A Person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other Crime,
>who shall flee from Justice, and be found in another State, shall on
>Demand of the executive Authority of the State from which he fled, be
>delivered up, to be removed to the State having Jurisdiction of the
>Crime." -- US Costitution, article 4, section 2.
>There is no exception for nonviolent crimes.
Art IV, § 2, cl 2, includes every offense from highest to lowest and
embraces misdemeanors as well as treason and felony. Gatewood v
Culbreath (1950, Fla) 47 So 2d 725.
Extradition may be had for any crime punishable under laws of
demanding state, including misdemeanors and petty offenses. State ex
rel. Knowles v Taylor (1929) 160 Tenn 44, 7 Smith 44, 22 SW2d 222.
Misdemeanors are extraditable offenses. Glover v State (1974) 257 Ark
241, 515 SW2d 641.
USCS Const. Art. IV, § 2, Cl 2 (LexisNexis).
Apparently, there's no exception at all. As a practical matter,
however, most states do not seek extradition to the full extent to
which they are entitled by the Constitution, choosing particular
grades of offense at which they will exercise their power.
Even these states, however, will extradite for anything they have the
power to, if for some reason, the specific case seems to warrant it.
Most protections of the rights of the accused are purely procedural
(i.e. did the state requesting extradition fill out the proper
paperwork). It's assumed that the accused can get a fair trial in the
requesting jurisdiction. There is probably some limit to that
presumption, e.g. if a state declared that all criminal trials were to
be adjudicated by flipping coins, the extraditing jurisdiction
explicitly stated it intended to frame the innocent accused, etc., it
would probably present a due process violation to grant extradition.
Probably not much less extreme than this would qualify.
In general, don't commit crimes and then run away, or for that matter,
run away when faced with false accusations. All you do is lose any
protections you might otherwise have had and piss off the court.
Additionally, if you flee after conviction, you lose the right to
appeal later under the fugitive disentitlement doctrine (except under
a very few limited circumstances including flight from imminent
murder).
Mike
> Thu, 09 Oct 2008 07:54:04 -0400 from David Spencer
> <spe...@panix.com>:
>> Star_no_Star <amanda...@gmail.com> writes:
> [refusal to extradite those accused of non-violent crimes]
>> "A Person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other
>> from which he fled, be delivered up, ..." -- US Costitution,
>> article 4, section 2.
>>
>> There is no exception for nonviolent crimes.
>
> right to trial by jury. "In ALL criminal prosecutions, the accused
>
> Nevertheless the Supremes have ruled that "all" doesn't actually mean
> "all", it means "some". I believe the dividing line, without a shred
> of justification in the Amendment, is crimed with a potential penalty
> of a year or more in jail.
Didn't they decide that a "crime" is only an offense above a particular
level (along the lines of the "high crimes and misdemeanors" that does
distinguish the two?) So that would mean that the "treason, felony, or
other crime" part would NOT cover misdemeanors, just as "criminal
prosecution" doesn't cover them.
Cy Pres
<miatt...@gmail.com> wrote:
>I'm not aware of any exception to the jury trial right. Are you sure
>you're not thinking of the right to an attorney at public expense
>(which is not actually in the Constitution)?
The Supreme Court seems to think it is, and has applied the principle
for some time. Certainly it did not originally interpret the clause
to grant the right to court appointed counsel to indigent defendants,
but after adopting this interpretation for capital cases, it gradually
expanded its view.
"In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a
[bunch of stuff] and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his
defense."
What the Sixth Amendment explicitly states can quite reasonably be
interpreted to mean exactly what it says, regardless of how it was
previously interpreted or even intended to be interpreted.
To the extent the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment
impacted the rest of the Constitution, the ruling in Gideon v.
Wainwright in 1963 incorporating the Sixth Amendment against the
states (and overrulling Betts v. Brady which held the contrary) was
entirely logical.
It's hardly a flight of fancy. Even a strict textualist could read
the Constitution and quite reasonably interpret it as providing
counsel for all defendants. The Sixth Amendment certainly does not
explicitly exclude the indigent from the right to counsel, and to
speak of a right to counsel while limiting it to the wealthy would be
absurd.
I doubt from today's perspective that we could view a Constitution
which promises due process and equal protection as even conceivably
allowing the conviction of defendants, often indigent and ignorant of
legal procedures, before courts they can't even understand. We
correctly view such proceedings today as a travesty of justice.
Deadrat
news:gm41f4dpp62d1nh0k...@4ax.com:
> On Oct 10, 6:36=A0am, Stan Brown <the_stan_br...@fastmail.fm> wrote:
>
>> Right, but neither are there any exceptions in the Sixth Amendment
>> right to trial by jury. =A0"In ALL criminal prosecutions, the accused
>> shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial
>> jury. ... [emphasis added]"
>>
>> Nevertheless the Supremes have ruled that "all" doesn't actually mean
>> "all", it means "some". =A0I believe the dividing line, without a shred
>> of justification in the Amendment, is crimed with a potential penalty
>> of a year or more in jail.
>
> I'm not aware of any exception to the jury trial right. Are you sure
> you're not thinking of the right to an attorney at public expense
> (which is not actually in the Constitution)?
"Petty offenses" do not trigger the 6th Amendment right to trial. See
District of Columbia v. Colts, 282US63 (1930). The Court reiterated their
pronouncement in District Of Columbia V. Clawans, 300US617 (1937). The
Court does not define the term "petty offense," but it includes criminal
contempt, in which the punishment was six-month's imprisonment. See Cheff
v. Schnakcenberg, 384US373 (1966).
Stan Brown
> "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to
> a [bunch of stuff] and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his
> defense."
>
> What the Sixth Amendment explicitly states can quite reasonably be
> interpreted to mean exactly what it says,
... as long as you remember that "all", ordinarily one of the least
ambiguous words in the English language, doesn't actually mean "all"
in that amendment. In a series of cases extending from (I think)
1904 to 1970, the Supreme Court, in its infinite wisdom, has decided
that "all" actually means "some".
Seth
Stan Brown <the_sta...@fastmail.fm> wrote:
>Sun, 12 Oct 2008 07:59:08 -0400 from Cy Pres <c.p...@yahoo.com>:
>> "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to
>> a [bunch of stuff] and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his
>> defense."
>>
>> What the Sixth Amendment explicitly states can quite reasonably be
>> interpreted to mean exactly what it says,
>
>... as long as you remember that "all", ordinarily one of the least
>ambiguous words in the English language, doesn't actually mean "all"
>in that amendment. In a series of cases extending from (I think)
>1904 to 1970, the Supreme Court, in its infinite wisdom, has decided
>that "all" actually means "some".
Does "the right to have" necessarily imply "the obligation of the
government to provide"?
Freedom of Speech doesn't require the government to provide people
with articial larynxes.
Seth
John F. Carr
Barry Gold <bg...@nyx.net> wrote:
>Deadrat <a...@b.com> wrote:
>>> I'm not aware of any exception to the jury trial right. Are you sure
>>> you're not thinking of the right to an attorney at public expense
>>> (which is not actually in the Constitution)?
>
>>District of Columbia v. Colts, 282US63 (1930). The Court reiterated their
>>pronouncement in District Of Columbia V. Clawans, 300US617 (1937). The
>>Court does not define the term "petty offense," but it includes criminal
>>contempt, in which the punishment was six-month's imprisonment. See Cheff
>>v. Schnakcenberg, 384US373 (1966).
>
>practice it seems to be jail time vs. fine. I've heard of many cases
>where the law provided jail time as a possible punishment, but the
>prosecution waived the possibility of incarceration in order not to
>trigger the Gideon right to counsel.
The federal constitutional standards for lawyers and juries are different.
If you can't be sent to jail you have no rights.
If you can be sent to jail for six months or less, you have the
right to a lawyer but no right to a fair trial. This is the
"petty offense" exception, which applies to juries but not
lawyers.
If you can be sent to jail for more than six months you have the
right to a lawyer and trial by jury.
In Massachusetts you have the right to a lawyer and a jury if
you are charged with any crime. The Bill of Rights was intended
to be based on Massachusetts law, but didn't work out that way.
--
John Carr (j...@mit.edu)
Barry Gold
>Does "the right to have" [an attorney--BG] necessarily imply
"the obligation of the
>government to provide"?
>
>Freedom of Speech doesn't require the government to provide people
>with articial larynxes.
Well, the US Supreme Court has ruled that the government is required
to provide an attorney, except for "petty offenses". So I guess the
Constitution _does_ imply that -- since Gideon v. Wainwright.
And while the government isn't required to provide people with
artificial larynxes, note the "public forum" rules. Basically, if you
have an area (like shopping mall or parking lot) that is shared by
multiple businesses, and they let _some_ people use it for free speech
purposes, they have to let _everybody_ use it. You can't allow, e.g.,
a group supporting proposition A put up a table to solicit signatures,
and then tell a group supporting proposition B that they mayn't.
(But AFAIK you can tell both of them, "only between the hours of X and
Y, take up no more than z square feet, and don't block the doorways or
use amplified devices.)
Barry Gold
>In Massachusetts you have the right to a lawyer and a jury if
>you are charged with any crime. The Bill of Rights was intended
>to be based on Massachusetts law, but didn't work out that way.
Does that include traffic offenses? Can you get a jury trial on a
speeding ticket with a court-provided lawyer?
Cy Pres
>Does "the right to have" necessarily imply "the obligation of the
>government to provide"?
If you have the right to be represented by counsel in a criminal
trial, the government incurs the obligation to provide you one by
charging you criminally. Except to the extent you chose to commit a
crime (which is yet to be demonstrated), you did not choose for the
government to prosecute you criminally. The government made that
choice.
The government is not similarly obligated to provide you with counsel
when you are the plaintiff in a case you chose to bring. There, we
trust (whether or not it is a good idea) to the market to provide
counsel for people with meritorious cases, at least to the extent
there's enough money in them to make it worthwhile.
Cy Pres
>If you can be sent to jail for six months or less, you have the
>right to a lawyer but no right to a fair trial. This is the
>"petty offense" exception, which applies to juries but not
>lawyers.
On what do you base your assertion that you are not entitled to a fair
trial? Did you mean not entitled to a jury trial? A trial before a
judge is also required to be fair.
Seth
Anybody who can say that with a straight face has never observed a
Traffic Court.
Seth
Barry Gold
>Amendment was merely to prevent the government from prohibiting
>representation of the accused?
Yes, and before Gideon I would said that's all it meant. But our
understanding _as a society_ of what our God-given (and
constitutionally guaranteed) rights mean _does_ change with time.
That's why the court ruled that the (intentionally?) vague 9th
amendment provides a right of privacy in limited circumstances --
including the right to use contraceptives (Griswold v. Connecticut)
and to have a non-viable fetus aborted from her womb (Roe v. Wade).
It also ruled that applying the death penalty for any crime other than
intentional murder violated the 8th amendment's ban on "cruel and
unusual punishment" (Coker v. Georgia).
None of these rights had been generally understood before the court
ruled that way, but it was quite clear that the general feeling in the
US was leaning that way, even if it had not yet reached the threshold
needed to overcome the natural inertia in the legislative process.
>Are you similarly enamored with the penumbral "right" of a woman to
>rip an unborn child from her womb?
This is getting perilously close to Godwin's law. However, my
personal take on Roe v. Wade was that it was the "right" result (that
women should not be enslaved to their unborn child) but that the
reasoning was suspect at best. (But then, if Roe is suspect, so is
Griswold...)
As far as the general societal attitude, the Court may have
over-estimated the readiness of general US society to tolerate
abortions. And yet, the answer really depends on how you ask the
question.
Ask a large sample of Americans if a woman should be entitled to an
abortion under _all_ circumstances (a pure "pro-choice" position), and
a lot more than 50% will answer "no".
Ask the same sample if abortion should be illegal under all
circumstances, and the overwhelming answer is (again) "no".
So, somewhere in between those two positions. And who decides, and
under what circumstances, and why?
Note that even under Roe, before the court began chipping away at the
edges (allowing parental notification laws, cooling-off periods,
etc.), the court held that a viable fetus may not be killed. The
court ruled against the "partial birth abortion" law not because they
favored such a method (almost nobody does) but because the law
provided _no_ exceptions no matter how severe the medical necessity or
the circumstances the woman might find herself in.
>Where is the Constitutional line between interpretation and
>legislating?
Ah, that one is an easy one to answer:
Any decision the speaker agrees with is "interpretation". Any
decision the speaker disagrees with si "legislating".
Cy Pres
>John F. Carr <j...@mit.edu> wrote:
>>In Massachusetts you have the right to a lawyer and a jury if
>>you are charged with any crime. The Bill of Rights was intended
>>to be based on Massachusetts law, but didn't work out that way.
>Does that include traffic offenses? Can you get a jury trial on a
>speeding ticket with a court-provided lawyer?
Presumably if the traffic offense involves six months or more of jail
time, it constitutes a criminal offense for which one would be
entitled to a jury. There might be other times you might get one,
though I'd be hard pressed to name any. I believe that, in general,
traffic offenses are treated as summary offenses or infractions or
other minor violations of the law which can be summarily adjudicated
without offending due process guarantees.
Barry Gold
>On Thu, 16 Oct 2008 08:24:01 -0400, bg...@nyx.net (Barry Gold) wrote:
>
>>John F. Carr <j...@mit.edu> wrote:
>>>In Massachusetts you have the right to a lawyer and a jury if
>>>you are charged with any crime. The Bill of Rights was intended
>>>to be based on Massachusetts law, but didn't work out that way.
>
>>Does that include traffic offenses? Can you get a jury trial on a
>>speeding ticket with a court-provided lawyer?
>
>Presumably if the traffic offense involves six months or more of jail
>time, it constitutes a criminal offense for which one would be
>entitled to a jury.
I wasn't asking about the US COnstitution's due process guarantees. I
was responding to Carr's statement about Massachusetts law. So the
question is, what is the threshold at which _Massachusetts_ law grants
the defendant a (government-paid) lawyer?
Cy Pres
>From a practical perspective, the purpose of the traffic ticket system
in general is to raise revenue. The courts set up to adjudicate these
issues act in conformity with that goal.
But all proceedings like this are constitutionally required to be
fair. I didn't say they actually are fair. And again, from a
pragmatic perspective, the injustice of an occasional unfair traffic
ticket is so trivial that we can survive it as a society. The amount
of process required should be commensurate with the harm associated
with unfair adjudication. Therefore, one would hope a capital case
would get the full attention of the law. I'm satisfied that the
republic will survive traffic tickets being adjudicated by a bored
traffic judge going through a couple hundred cases in a day.
Stan Brown
<miatt...@gmail.com>:
> Have you considered the possibility that the purpose of the 6th
> Amendment was merely to prevent the government from prohibiting
> representation of the accused?
If I recall correctly, in the late 18th century, in England, the
accused in most crimes had no right to counsel, not even if he could
afford to hire a barrister. So the Sixth Amendment was extremely
progressive simply in allowing an accused to hire counsel.
John F. Carr
Barry Gold <bg...@nyx.net> wrote:
>John F. Carr <j...@mit.edu> wrote:
>>In Massachusetts you have the right to a lawyer and a jury if
>>you are charged with any crime. The Bill of Rights was intended
>>to be based on Massachusetts law, but didn't work out that way.
>
>Does that include traffic offenses? Can you get a jury trial on a
>speeding ticket with a court-provided lawyer?
I'll trust the other response in this thread saying that fine-only
offenses do not come with a right to government-paid counsel.
I don't think I ever drove a car here at a time when speeding
was treated as a crime. Speeding tickets and most other fine-only
traffic offenses were decriminalized decades ago in order to strip
away the general procedural protections that come with criminal
charges. For example there is now a legal presumption of guilt.
If the ticket says you were speeding, it is up to you to prove
otherwise and case law says that the judge may find the piece of
paper more credible than oral testimony.
--
John Carr (j...@mit.edu)
jeff.ja...@gmail.com
> On Oct 7, 2:51=3DA0pm, Star_no_Star <amanda.du...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > I overheard someone mentioning that in the state of Oregon, non
> > violent offenders could not be extradited to other states. Is this
> > true?
>=20
> Article IV of the US Constitution reads:
> "A person charged in any state with treason, felony, or other crime,
> who shall flee from justice, and be found in another state, shall on
> demand of the executive authority of the state from which he fled, be
> delivered up, to be removed to the state having jurisdiction of the
> crime."
>=20
> With this being said, warrants for arrest usually are entered into the
> law enforcement information network (LEIN) with a radius for
> extradition. A non-violent offense might have a radius of extradition
> of 25 miles (the distance that the issuing jurisdiction will send law
> enforcement to pick up the offender). Thus if someone is arrested on a
> warrant where the issuing jurisdiction will not send for the offender,
> then the arresting agency will usually tell the offender to clear up
> the warrant and release the offender.
>=20
> The Feds are not so constrained. There is no extradition requirement
> for a Federal offender who commits an offense in Alaska and is
> arrested in Washington, DC.
you are correct the US Constitution does provide for extradition to and fro=
m any state but along with your other points many of the warrants in the NC=
IC DB are marked an NE (non extraditable) meaning the jurisdiction where he=
/she is wanted won't bother to come and get them. read this article here, =
as always it's all about the money. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nat=
ion/2014/03/11/fugitives-next-door/6262719/
Micky
wrote:
>On Wednesday, 8 October 2008 17:41:15 UTC+7, mike boersma wrote:
>> law enforcement information network (LEIN) with a radius for
>> extradition. A non-violent offense might have a radius of extradition
>> of 25 miles (the distance that the issuing jurisdiction will send law
>> enforcement to pick up the offender). Thus if someone is arrested on a
>> warrant where the issuing jurisdiction will not send for the offender,
>> then the arresting agency will usually tell the offender to clear up
>> the warrant and release the offender.
>>=20
>> The Feds are not so constrained. There is no extradition requirement
>> for a Federal offender who commits an offense in Alaska and is
>> arrested in Washington, DC.
>
>you are correct the US Constitution does provide for extradition to and fro=
>m any state but along with your other points many of the warrants in the NC=
>IC DB are marked an NE (non extraditable) meaning the jurisdiction where he=
>/she is wanted won't bother to come and get them. read this article here, =
>as always it's all about the money. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nat=
>ion/2014/03/11/fugitives-next-door/6262719/
this, one can avoid justice just by knowing to go more than 25 miles
away, or more than a longer distance for a more serious crime.
With all the advances these days in communciation and transportation,
couldn't some arrangement be made with FEDEX or Amazon trucking and
drones that would allow extradition at a much lower cost?