What happens if a person commits a crime in one State and flees to another? What if it’s only considered a “crime” in the first State? For example, someone has a warrant in Kansas for pot possession and moves to Colorado? Or charges related to drag performance in Texas, but now lives in California?

5 comments

  1. States are required upon demand by another state to extradite people charged with a crime (indicted) in that state.

  2. The state can ask for a person to be extradited for something that is a crime in their state but not in the asylum state.

    The prosecuting state can go to federal court and the federal court can order the extradition.

    Practically, for minor things like weed possession the prosecutors won’t bother going through the extradition process and just wait for the person to return to their state to prosecute. But you never know. You could have a really gung ho prosecutor.

  3. There’s barely any “process.” The Constitution and federal statute render it basically automatic. All that has to happen is that one state requests that another state send the fugitive to them; there’s no analysis of the seriousness of the crime or anything like that.

    > For example, someone has a warrant in Kansas for pot possession and moves to Colorado? Or charges related to drag performance in Texas, but now lives in California?

    This is a very interesting question, and I think there will be some fascinating court cases about it in the next few years given the increasing tension between states on some hot-button issues. What happens when Oklahoma tries to extradite a resident for getting an illegal abortion then fleeing the state to somewhere where it’s legal? Will that state resist sending them back? Or, what happens if Oklahoma tries to ban abortions *outside their borders* by their own citizens (e.g. making it illegal for an Oklahoman to get an abortion in Massachusetts)? I could see some attempts by states, on both sides of the political spectrum (what happens when a Texan commits a gun violation in New York then returns to Texas?), to push the boundaries of interstate rendition law.

  4. Hooray! I get to answer something based on personal knowledge. In Colorado, the Public Defender’s Office defends individuals who are facing extradition to other states. It’s a complex legal process.

    The root of Extradition is within the Constitution, in Article IV. The Extradition Clause is a constitutional agreement amongst the states to allow extradition between them. 18 U.S.C. § 3182 governs the complex rules nationally for the process, and each state has their own system.

    To dumb it down, if you are arrested on an out of state warrant, you have two options: waive extradition or fight. If you waive extradition, you are held (usually without bond) and the state that issued the warrant has about a month to get you. If they don’t, you are typically released. However, the warrant remains active, so at any time you can get picked back up. If you choose to fight extradition, the state which issued the warrant has to issue a signed governor’s warrant and provide proof that the individual in custody in the other state is the person they are seeking. The state which arrested you has to review that warrant and documents and the governor also has to sign off on it. The courts receive these documents and, if you still want to fight, you set it for hearing.

    Extradition hearings have a burden of preponderance of the evidence, but in practice they’re mostly a formality. I don’t think I have ever seen a defendant actually win one. Once you invariably lose, the demanding state has 30 days to come get you again.

    Surprisingly, states frequently decline to extradite. This can pose a problem for defendants: they typically sit at least 30 days each time they get picked up, and some less scrupulous law enforcement agencies will re-arrest them on the warrant immediately upon release. This can result in people serving fairly endless cycles of getting re-arrested on the same warrant, not getting extradited to solve the warrant, and continuing to serve much longer than they ever would have served. Most prosecutors won’t keep bringing extradition cases when it becomes clear the state doesn’t want them, but some more conservative prosecutors go out of their way to keep people in these endless loops until a judge puts an end to it. I have seen a man in four year cycle of this for a case that would have had a maximum sentence of 2 years in the state he was charged in, and I’m sure that’s not the worst situation out there.

    The issues with the extradition system are not frequently talked about, but they’re a real problem to the people caught in them

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