In re Reinitz

39 F. 204, 23 Abb. N. Cas. 69
CourtU.S. Circuit Court for the District of Southern New York
DecidedJune 15, 1889
StatusPublished
Cited by9 cases

This text of 39 F. 204 (In re Reinitz) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Southern New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In re Reinitz, 39 F. 204, 23 Abb. N. Cas. 69 (circtsdny 1889).

Opinion

Brown, J.

The prisoner, upon the demand of this-Government, was extradited from Queenstown, Ireland, in April, 1889, under the treaty of 1842, upon a charge of forgery. He was tried upon that charge, in this city,, before a court and jury, and was acquitted on June 19. Within a few minutes thereafter, as he was leaving the court house he was arrested by the sheriff of this county upon an, order of arrest granted by the supreme court of the State on April 22, in a civil action for the recovery of $4,220.90, moneys of the plaintiff, alleged to have been wrongfully converted by the prisoner to his own use. Writs of habeas corpus and certiorari from this court were-thereupon obtained under section 752 of the Revised Statutes.

Upon the returns made to the writs by the sheriff,, including copies of all the papers in the civil action, there is no controversy as to the above facts ; and the only question is whether the prisoner after his acquittal was liable to-.arrest before the expiration of a reasonable time for his return to Ireland from whence he was extradited.

A preliminary objection is made that this court has no-jurisdiction to issue a writ of habeas corpus in such a case. But sections 752 and 753 of the U. S. Rev. Stats, provide for writs of habeas corpus to inquire into the “cause of restraint of liberty ” where the prisoner is “ in custody in violation of the Constitution, or of a law or treaty of the United' States.” The petition. presents facts sufficient to raise an inquiry upon that subject; and if a case under that clause of section 753 is made out, habeas corpus from the federal courts is an appropriate remedy, though the prisoner beheld under -process of the State courts (Exp. Royall, 117 U. S. 241; U. S. v. Rauscher, 119 Id. 407, 431; Wilden-. bus’s Case, 120 Id. 1). The preliminary objection there[71]*71fore presents no different question from that on the .merits of the application.

Until the decision in«the case of Eauscher {supra), in December, 1886, wide differences of opinion had prevailed in both the federal and State courts whether a prisoner extradited under a treaty for one offence could be tried for another. The supreme court in the case of Eauscher up on full consideration and a review of the leading authorities, has definitely settled that question, holding that an extradited prisoner cannot be arrested or tried for any offence except that for which he was extradited until the termination of the extradition proceedings and the lapse of a reasonable time thereafter to enable him to return to the country from which he was brought.

The case of Eauscher, however, like all the other reported cases on this subject, was a case of arrest and trial on a criminal charge. The only reported case to which I have been referred of a prisoner extradited from a foreign country and arrested in a civil suit is that of Adriauco v. Lagrave (1 Hun, 689 ; rev’d in 59 N. Y. 110), which arose in 1874, and does not essentially differ from the present case. The order of arrest was there set aside in the General Term, but was upheld in the court of appeals. The supreme court in the ease of Eauscher referred to the Lagrave case, and while alluding to the difference between an arrest on a criminal charge and an arrest in a civil suit incidental to the collection of a debt, withheld any expression of opinion as to the legality of an arrest in a civil suit under such circumstances.

The question to be now determined is whether there is any difference in the principles applicable that should lead to a different result.

The main difference of opinion has been as to the construction to be put upon extradition treaties ; and whether the surrender of the prisoner is to be deemed a surrender for a particular purpose only, with the implication that he is not to be restrained of his liberty for any other cause, or [72]*72whether the surrender, when made upon compliance with the preliminary conditions of the treaty, becomes an absolute surrender and without any such implied limitation. The latter was the view of a majority of the court of appeals in the case of Lagrave, while the opposite view was maintained at the General Term.

The decision of the court of appeals, however, was not based upon any grounds peculiar to an arrest in a civil suit, but upon grounds applicable alike to a civil and criminal arrest, without distinction. As those grounds are disapproved by the supreme court in the case of Rauscher and the right of criminal arrest denied, the Lagrave case, as an ^authority for a civil arrest, fails also. The opinion of the supreme court, treating the subject in the broadest manner, upholds in its general scope the views of Daniels, J., at the General Term in the Lagrave case ; and it reinforces them by its construction of sections 5270, 5272 and 5275 of the Rev. Stats, which are declared to be supplementary to the extradition treaties, and to enforce their implied limitations. The right of asylum is a principle of public laxv, ) ecognized by all sovereignties. Ro concession by a surrender of a prisoner in abridgment of this right is made, except for grave offences under careful restrictions that exclude minor misdemeanors, most political offences, and much more mere claims for the collection of debts. Though the implied restrictions of the treaty are for the most part spoken of by the supreme court in reference to a criminal arrest, since that was the question before the court, yet there are many passages in the opinion that in principle embrace equally arrests in civil suits. At page 420 it is said : “It is- therefore very clear that ... it was not intended that the treaty should be used for any other purpose than to secure the trial of the person extradited for one of the offences enumerated in the treaty.”

Again at p. 422 : “ As the right of transfer, the right to demand it, the obligation to grant it, the proceedings under which it takes place all show that it is for a limited and [73]*73■defined purpose that the transfer is made, it is impossible to •conceive of the exercise of jurisdiction in such a case for any other purpose than that mentioned in the treaty, and ascertained by the proceedings under which the party is ■extradited, without an implication of fraud upon the rights •of the party extradited, and of bad faith to the country which permitted his extradition.”

A.civil arrest is clearly as incompatible with such limitations as an arrest on a criminal offence.

So just in principle are such limitations that the court of appeals in the Lagrave ease declared that the provisions for protection against lawless violence under section 5275 U. S. ¡Rev. Stat. “ ought (by legislation) to be extended to protection from other prosecutions or detentions.” But that section, as •construed by the supreme court, does extend to protection from other prosecutions. It declares that “ the President ■shall have power to take all necessary measures for the transportation and safe keeping of such accused person, and for security against lawless violence, until the final conclusion of his trial for the crimes or offences specified in the warrant of extradition, and until his final discharge from custody, or imprisonment for or on account of such crimes or ■offences, and for a, reasonable time thereafter, and may employ such portion of the land or naval forces of the United States, or of the militia thereof, as may be necessary for the safekeeping and protection of the

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
39 F. 204, 23 Abb. N. Cas. 69, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-reinitz-circtsdny-1889.