# One American allegedly killing another American in another country. U.S. have any jurisdiction?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [December 13, 2012, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940 "2012-12-13T18:03:17Z")
**Posts on this page:** 18
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)
#### Post date: [December 13, 2012, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/1 "2012-12-13T18:03:17Z")
I know the U.S. extradites suspected criminals routinely.
Does the U.S. have any any jurisdiction over crimes Americans may have committed in other countries?
McAffee is suspected of killing American Gregory Faull in Belize. Oddly enough, this article makes no mention of an U.S. investigation.
I seem to recall this coming up before. Some guy was accused of drowning his wife during a scuba dive. He served time overseas and I think the U.S. justice dept got involved too? At the time I wondered why we were sticking our noses into it. Since the other country prosecuted the guy.
So what is our jurisdiction?
> **[McAfee's fate likely tied to Belize political relations](https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2012/12/13/mcafee-extradition-miami-belize/1765287/)**
>
> The next step for John McAfee depends in part on relations between the USA and Belize.
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### Author:  [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)
#### Post date: [December 13, 2012, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/2 "2012-12-13T18:13:00Z")
Apparently, there is a section of the [US code](http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1119) that deals with it.
IANAL, but it appears to state that if he’s left Belize and they don’t intend to bring him back to face charges, the US might prosecute. Otherwise, the US lets Belize deal with it.
I’d like to know what the legal beagles think, though.
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### Author:  [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)
#### Post date: [December 13, 2012, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/3 "2012-12-13T18:26:40Z")
Gabe Watson was the American guy on an ill fated honeymoon. Wife dies suspiciously on a scuba dive. Eventually acquitted in an Australian court then Alabama decided to try him. Seasonably, a judge threw the case out. I thought it bizarre because Australia certainly has a reputable legal system. Fully capable of handling a murder case.
Jurisdiction seems pretty murky for overseas crime.
[http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/watson-freed-due-to-lack-of-evidence/story-e6freoof-1226281072835](http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/watson-freed-due-to-lack-of-evidence/story-e6freoof-1226281072835)
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### Author:  [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)
#### Post date: [December 13, 2012, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/4 "2012-12-13T18:36:17Z")
Make that **sensibly**. :smack: Darn spell check got me again.
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### Author:  [@BubbaDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BubbaDog)
#### Post date: [December 13, 2012, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/5 "2012-12-13T18:40:24Z")
> [@aceplace57](#):
>
> Make that **sensibly**. :smack: Darn spell check got me again.
And there I was thinking it was a Christmas thing.
_Tis the Season to dismiss murder charges_
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### Author:  [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)
#### Post date: [December 13, 2012, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/6 "2012-12-13T18:45:04Z")
Also, Australia did convict him of manslaughter. Alabama wanted to pile on with double jeopardy. Another reason that overseas jurisdiction makes sense.
> **[Death of Tina Watson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Tina_Watson)**
>
> Tina Watson was a 26-year-old American woman from Helena, Alabama, who died while scuba diving in Queensland, Australia, on 22 October 2003. Tina had been on her honeymoon with her new husband, American Gabe Watson, who was initially charged by Queensland authorities with his wife's murder. Watson pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was sentenced to a term of imprisonment.
> Evidence presented at the trial included Watson's differing accounts of what had happened on that day, of the couple's div...
> [@](#):
>
> Gabe was sentenced to four and a half years in jail, to be suspended after serving only twelve months.
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### Author:  [@Blakeyrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blakeyrat)
#### Post date: [December 13, 2012, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/7 "2012-12-13T19:22:18Z")
I’m guessing there’s a lot of wiggle-room here. The answer’s certainly different for, say, North Korea or Iran than it is for Belize.
I’m guessing as with the Australia case, basically if the country involved has a mature, stable legal system and takes the initiative in doing the police work in a scientific manner, there’s really no reason for the US to intervene.
Especially in a case like the McAfee one where McAfee (as of awhile back) stated quite clearly he had no intention of ever returning to the US. The murdered neighbor was also a permanent resident of Belize, if not a citizen. So… let Belize handle it.
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### Author:  [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)
#### Post date: [December 13, 2012, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/8 "2012-12-13T19:32:49Z")
> [@aceplace57](#):
>
> Alabama wanted to pile on with double jeopardy.
That would make for an interesting case.
I can see the federal government having jurisdiction. But does Alabama even cover this in their state laws?
And even if they didn’t, do they have some kind of agreement with foreign governments separate from that of the US? Otherwise, they’re out of luck if a foreign government tells them to take a flying leap for purposes of extradition, sharing evidence, or anything else Alabama might want for the prosecution.
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### Author:  [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)
#### Post date: [December 14, 2012, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/9 "2012-12-14T03:19:03Z")
> [@aceplace57](#):
>
> Also, Australia did convict him of manslaughter. Alabama wanted to pile on with double jeopardy…
It’s not double jeopardy: [Double Jeopardy Clause - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Jeopardy_Clause#Dual_sovereignty_doctrine). Australia is a sovereign nation; Alabama is one of the United States. Assuming its laws created the crime with which the defendant was charged, Alabama was within its rights to prosecute regardless of the outcome of the Australian case.
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [December 14, 2012, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/10 "2012-12-14T03:42:16Z")
I believe that technically, the prosecution in Australia was a
Queensland one, wasn’t it?
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### Author:  [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)
#### Post date: [December 14, 2012, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/11 "2012-12-14T03:57:10Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#):
>
> I believe that technically, the prosecution in Australia was a
> Queensland one, wasn’t it?
Yes – as in the U.S., ordinary criminal law is handled at the state level in Australia rather than federally.
I believe that, in the Gabe Watson case, the argument to bring it under the jurisdiction of Alabama courts was that the planning and first steps of the crime took place in Alabama. Generally, events simply taking place in Queensland would not involve Alabama, even if they involved two citizens of the state of Alabama.
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### Author:  [@Apocalypso](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apocalypso)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2012, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/12 "2012-12-15T01:12:07Z")
There was a local (Pittsburgh area) teenager on a trip to India with his mother when she was murdered. Both were US citizens, but he was tried in Indian courts.
[link to the story](http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/local/region/indian-court-clears-local-s-fayette-teen-of-murder-635573/)
Summary: The boy was tried and convicted in an Indian juvenile court. The high court then overturned his conviction, and the US embassy in India is now preparing to send him back home.
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### Author:  [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2012, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/13 "2012-12-15T01:33:15Z")
The US has the ability to assert jurisdiction over its citizens wherever they are in the world.
_See_ Blackmer v. United States, 284 US 421 (1932).
The US does this in regards to prostitution involving minors, for example (as well as buying things from Cuba - ie, as an American you can be prosecuted for buying a Cuban cigar in England, even though it’s perfectly legal there).
There is also the ability for a country to enforce laws extraterritorally when the acts impact the nation in question.
“it is settled… that any state may impose liabilities, even upon persons not within its allegiance, for conduct outside its borders which the state reprehends; and these other states will ordinarily recognize.”
United States v. Aluminum Co. of America, 148 F. Supp. 416 (2d Cir. 1945)
A pretty good statement came from Justice Gray in 1895:
"No law has any effect, of its own force, beyond the limits of the sovereignty from which its authority is derived. The extent to which the law of one nation, as put force within its territory… shall be allowed to operate within the dominion of another nation, depends on what our greatest jurists have been content to call ‘the commity of nations.’…
‘Commity,’ in the legal sense, is neither a matter of absolute obligation, on the one hand, nor of mere courtesy and goodwill, upon the other. But it is the recognition which one nation allows within its territory to the legislative, executive, or judicial acts of anothe rnation, having due regard both to international duty and convenience, and to the rights of its own citizens or of other persons who are under the protection of its laws."
Hilton v. Guyot, 159 US 113 (1895).
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### Author:  [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2012, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/14 "2012-12-15T02:29:39Z")
Nitpick: it’s “comity.”
> **[Comity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comity)**
>
> In law, comity is "a practice among different political entities (as countries, states, or courts of different jurisdictions)" involving the "mutual recognition of legislative, executive, and judicial acts."
> Comity derives from the Latin cōmitās, courtesy, from cōmis, friendly, courteous.
> The doctrine of international comity has been described variously "as a choice-of-law principle, a synonym for private international law, a rule of public international law, a moral obligation, expediency, cou...
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### Author:  [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2012, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/15 "2012-12-15T02:41:43Z")
Yes, quite.
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### Author:  [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2012, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/16 "2012-12-15T04:00:00Z")
> [@Great\_Antibob](#):
>
> I can see the federal government having jurisdiction. But does Alabama even cover this in their state laws?
>
> And even if they didn’t, do they have some kind of agreement with foreign governments separate from that of the US?
Alabama’s government cannot make a treaty with a foreign government.
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### Author:  [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2012, 8:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/17 "2012-12-15T08:02:43Z")
There was a case in Trinidad where a Trinidadian with apparently no link to the USA killed a dual Trini/USA citizen residing in Trinidad, the USA requested him to be extradited for trial.
And looking up on the case it has even become stranger with the USA requesting the extradition of his wife and sons(presumably USA citizens?) for other charges related to the murder case like kidnapping.
> **[Balo's wife faces extradition](https://www.guardian.co.tt/article-6.2.458668.f238cea18e)**
>
> News
So yea I don’t think there would be a problem going after an actual citizen murdering another.
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### Author:  [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)
#### Post date: [December 16, 2012, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/one-american-allegedly-killing-another-american-in-another-country-u-s-have-any-jurisdiction/643940/18 "2012-12-16T17:44:28Z")
> [@aceplace57](#):
>
> Make that **sensibly**. :smack: Darn spell check got me again.
Funny, I read that as a misspelling for “reasonably” which is equally good.