(DISCLAIMER: This is simply a hypothetical. I do not need answer fast and I lack the capability or wherewithal to actually do anything like this. I am not planning to kidnap anyone nor seeking any advice on how to do so - I am simply curious as to the legal ramifications of this scenario. I do not intend for this to become a political discussion about Snowden, the NSA, etc. - he’s simply the most convenient person to base this scenario on.)
Let’s assume that I’m a civic-minded billionaire with too much money for my own good connections to People Who Know People (wink wink nudge nudge), and I’ve had just about enough of this Edward Snowden geek living the high life in Moscow and thumbing his nose at the American people. With the help of some ex-military and PMC types, I hatch a plan to locate him in Russia, capture him alive, smuggle him out of the country, and deliver him into the hands of US authorities.
My men on the ground in Moscow spend days or weeks shadowing Snowden to watch for a moment when he can be approached silently. When they get their chance, they come at him from behind and hustle him into a waiting van where he’s quickly cuffed, hooded, and knocked unconscious. The van makes its way to a private airstrip somewhere outside the city where one of my privately owned jets is waiting, the goons hustle him aboard, and it quickly takes off bound for the nearest airfield over which the US holds full jurisdiction (Alaska? Somewhere in the Mediterranean?) They have managed up to this point to pull off the job without alerting the Russian authorities or anyone noticing he’s missing until they’re in the air, and the plane manages to elude notice until it’s out of Russian airspace and over international waters. As the plane begins to approach its destination, the pilot radios ATC at the American airfield to notify them that Edward Snowden is onboard and fully secured and requests that any available law enforcement officials meet the plane on the tarmac in order to take him into custody for the crimes he currently has a warrant against him for.
Assume that in the course of carrying out this operation, my goons have committed no crimes other than those directly related to the kidnapping - they haven’t assaulted anyone or fired a weapon, resisted arrest, parked illegally, violated the speed limit, etc. Would I, or anyone else involved in this scheme - the goons, the driver, the pilot, etc. - have committed a crime under US law? Likewise (and notwithstanding any attempts to bend the law in order to reestablish political goodwill with Moscow), would any of us be potentially subject to being extradited to Russia to face charges there? Has something like this happened before to the extent that there’s actually a precedent as to what to do when it happens?
Overimaginative minds who spent too many of their formative years reading Tom Clancy need to know.
It appears on my reading of the law, that if you transport the kidnapped person within the special aircraft jurisdiction of the U.S., you have then committed the crime of kidnapping in the U.S. That seems to involve using a U.S. Registered airplane or if it departed or is arriving in the U.S.
It doesn’t seem to prohibit kidnapping a person in Russia and transporting them by non-American aircraft to, say, a European country.
Dog got into trouble under Mexican law. I don’t think there’s any doubt the OP would be committing an offence under Russian law. The question is if the OP would be in trouble under US law.
Whatever the American authorities might think, I am quite confident that you would have committed some very serious crimes in Russia. Perhaps you are hypocritical and jingoistic enough not to care about breaking foreign laws, however (even perfectly reasonable ones, with direct American equivalents).
In the late '80’s, Australian businessman Christopher Skase embezzled a large amount of money from his collapsing business, and fled to Majorca. When the Australian government didn’t seem able to extradite him, a local TV host [sup]*[/sup] started raising money to, quite seriously, hire bounty hunters to go haul him back.
The stunt was called off when legal types opined that it might actually jeopardise the chance of him being tried at all. I forget the explicit legal principle in question. But it seems right that, if the prosecution can’t bring in evidence that’s been obtained illegally, they also can’t bring in a defendant who’s been obtained illegally.
The bastard never did go to trial, but he didn’t last all that long with his loot either - he died in 2001 after about eleven or twelve years on the run.
[sup]*[/sup] The marvellous Andrew Denton. And in looking up his wiki page, I accidentally discovered I share a birthday with him. My day is made
Seriously creepy.
However, when slammed into jail, Mr. Limbaugh would lead the campaign for your pardon. Free The Smapti One !
Still, the fuck ? Even* if* you considered this person a traitor governments have tolerated far more egregious examples fled abroad and would have gone spare if they were returned by citizen’s executive action: Kim Philby, George Blake, and the Singing, Dancing Duo of Burgess and Maclean come to mind, who individually spent the high life for decades in small flats in Moscow.
The high life being relative as to whether you are an 18th century Polish serf.
[ And I just discovered that Mr. Blake is still alive in Moscow, aged 91. ]
And, of course, every single person, government or not, who saw you kidnap somebody, would be entitled to use deadly force to hinder you and your minions. You would have a greater chance of success of making a citizen’s arrest of Mr. Obama in the White House for being a muslim, commie traitor, as so many of your compatriot’s fantasize.
I urge you to seriously consider this alternative.
This used to happen in Brazil all the time. Brazil had loopholes in its extradition policy, so there were a lot of fugitives in Brazil who were wanted in the USA, many of them for financial crimes with substantial rewards offered. Private entrepreneurs kidnapped them in Brazil, hired Lear Jets, brought them back to the USA and handed them over to the appropriate authorities.
They only place they committed any crime was kidnapping, in Brazil, so they didn’t really have any real repercussions to worry about.
Maybe in the OP’s fantasy they’d shoot back & rack up a nice body count. The problem with that is that this is murder in the act of a felony ( if any of the OP’s Billionaire’s US Citizen Henchmen are killed or if they kill people on the OP’s behalf).
Now, lets say the OP’s Billionaire lives in a state with a nice felony-murder law. (Hey, but it had nice tax breaks & let him sleep with his machine guns nightly). And that billionaire, being the lazy person that the lazy thinking demonstrated implies,
they cooked up this whole plan, orchestrated it and financed it electronically from their home.
A DA could make a nice high-profile win against a billionaire like that, which leaves only the question of “What’s the penalty for felony murder”.
Needle in your arm? Shame On You!!!
…we’re going to close FOX News on a sad note tonight…
It’s hypothetical. That’s even the first word in the title. We have threads at least as weird as this all the time, they’re just not all started by Smapti.
The OP clearly says no one is harmed in this hypothetical. No shooting.
I’ve had just about enough of this Edward Snowden geek living the high life in Moscow and thumbing his nose at the American people.
This is ressentiment at it’s finest.
Plans always work out well on the ground. See the œuvre of the great John Dortmunder.
I imagine Obama would thank you and throw you to the wolves. Or just lock you up here. The US has laws making it illegal to break the law of any other country. They’re sort of catch-all ‘loitering types’, but they exist.
There’s a crime of unlawful confinement (or sometimes unlawful restraint). It’s somewhat distinct from kidnapping. It makes it illegal to hold a person in captivity.
Now you may have kidnapped Snowden in Russia. But at some point you brought him into the United States. And assuming he hadn’t agreed to the trip that means you were unlawfully confining him inside American jurisdiction.
Ten years ago it was "What if I showed up in front of mayor Bloomberg at a press conference with Osama Bin Laden in chains and said, “Here’s your terrorist, now-gimme-my-money”.
Basically, the answer was determined to be, “Thanks! You have the right to remain silent…”
