So just coming across CNN is the release of Jeffrey Fowle in North Korea. Apparently he intentionally broke the law in North Korea (judgment of the validity of the law he broke being irrelevant) by leaving a Bible in his hotel room.
He knowingly broke the law, got caught and then begged the US to extract him from his predicament. Does he face any charges or costs or bear any responsibility for the infrastructure or time the US government spent in getting him back due to his own intentional acts?
Also, what happens with respect to his “criminal record”? Is he going to be considered an ex-con and banned from possessing firearms or holding certain licenses, or is he exempt? Is there a blanket exemption for foreign convictions or is it done on a case-by-case basis (by whom?) to determine if the foreign conviction is serious enough and un-American enough to “count” as equivalent to a domestic criminal record?
That would actually be ironic and sad in a way. Maybe next month he goes and applies to teach Vacation Bible School and they turn him away for being a convicted felon…
Well, the law is certainly valid. You may question its ethical legitimacy, but from a legal point of view, it is without a doubt a valid law, because it was enacted by the competent organs of a state which has, under international law, the authority to legislate on affairs that take place within its borders, even if the regime running the state is as despicable and abhorrent as the North Korean one. Of course in doing so, the state is bound by human rights, but a violation of human rights will not necessarily invalidate a law domestically.
I’m not just saying this to be nitpicky, I’m saying it for two reasons. Firstly, a lot of people (and I’m not including the OP here, but the point still deserves to be made) are under the erroneous assumption that they are somewhat immune from the laws of the country where they currently are simply because they hold a foreign passport; and secondly, because a lot of people (again, no inclusion of the OP implied) complain about the laws of other countries being “unfair” while taking a completely opposite position when the roles are inverted, i.e., when their own country is making laws and expects foreigners to abide by them while staying there.
I don’t think this is true as generally as you say. The Constitution allows states to disenfranchise on the basis of “participation in rebellion, or other crime” (14th Amendment, section 2), so it’s not obvious to me that states may not disenfranchise for crimes (not necessarily felonies!) committed outside that state or even the United States. It may well be that historically or currently, no state has decided to do so, but that’s a matter of interpreting the various state laws.
Agree with everything you say here. My question refers to the responsibility the person bears to the US government for his actions in a foreign nation when he gets back on US soil (e.g. the cost of diplomatic negotiations or the infrastucture involved with flying a large US military plane to North Korea to pick his ass up.
If you are genuinely concerned, felony disenfranchisement only applies during incarceration in Ohio (where Fowle lives) and is lifted upon parole or release. And Ohio does in fact recognize other states’ convictions for disenfranchisement purposes, but unsurprisingly does not recognize foreign convictions.
There is a legal provision giving U.S. citizens an entitlement for help to obtain a release in such cases, but there’s discussion for the executive (which, I guess, would in practice be the consular officers of the State Department) as to what exactly will be done. I guess that provision makes it difficult for the State Department to recover costs incurred in providing that assistance.
[QUOTE=Really Not All That Bright]
Don’t be daft.
[/QUOTE]
It wasn’t my intention to be “daft”, a word which I’m asking you to take back. It was just my intention to point out that a overly sweeping and generalising answer is not necessarily accurate unlesss you’ve really made sure that what you say is true. In fact, the link you yourself provided about Ohio disproved your statement, namely, that all states disenfranchise only for crimes committed in their own territory, so I don’t see at all what was “daft” about my post.
I’m curious about this too. My understanding is that some states do have restrictions on people who have committed felonies (handgun restrictions, voting restrictions, etc). It seems unlikely to me that any state would take North Korea’s bible related law seriously. But what about things that are serious crimes in the US itself and convictions by less suspect countries? Lets say, for example, someone goes on a shooting spree in Australia, gets convicted and deported back to the US after they’ve done their jail time. Is there a mechanism to apply restrictions to this person?
All I meant to point out is that asking if somebody has checked the laws of all 50 states is daft. I haven’t, and neither has anyone else. However, I will take it back because it’s appropriate for GQ, and I apologize for using that term.
You were replying to a post that began with the word “generally”. That is as distinguished from “universally”, “absolutely”, or any other term that implies complete or near-complete unanimity. My post was intended to indicate that the majority of states (Louisiana, to use one example, though it recognizes federal convictions) do not recognize out-of-state convictions for these purposes. Some do, like Florida.
This is all frankly irrelevant because we are talking about an overseas conviction; I was just using the state conviction issue to make a point.
I would assume that a guideline would be similar to that applied to extradition – A state governor will normally sign extradition only in the case where the crime would be a criminal act in that state. For example, Canada did not extradite American draft dodgers in the Vietnam era, because avoiding conscription was not a criminal act in Canada. Under that doctrine, if leaving a Bible in a hotel room is not a criminal act in Ohio, then Ohio would not recognize as a felon any person who had done so in any jurisdiction, even if it was a criminal offense abroad.
Interesting point, and makes sense for this case, but it could become hairy with respect to overseas crimes that seem sorta reasonable but don’t seem to match up exactly. And then, who adjudicates the similarity of foreign and domestic offenses? Is there a Tennessee Board of Foreign Conviction Review and Classification?
E.g. suppose Bill, a US citizen, is convicted of Possession of a Handgun Within 10 Meters of a Public School in a trial before a Royal Criminal Court of New Ruritania. He serves his time and eventually gets deported back to the US. He settles down in Kansas, where it is a felony to possess a handgun within 9 meters of a public school. So is Bill a convicted felon in Kansas? It’s so close, but not quite there. Trivial enough to overlook and brand him? Then Bill gets tired of all the drama and moves to New Hampshire, where there is a law against possessing a handgun within twenty meters of a public school, but it only applies if the defendant intends to commit Mopery, Aggravated Mopery, Second Degree Spleening, or any class A, B, or C felony. The Ruritanian court didn’t make any ruling on whether such intent did or did not exist because it was irrelevant to the case under black-letter Ruritanian law. And then Bill jumps in with a question as to what definition should be used for “public school”, because under Ruritanian law, a privately run school that has received a Royal Award Scholarship is legally considered a “Public School” under the Advancing Education Ruritania Act 2011 for purposes of qualifying for additional grant money, and please Mr. New Hampshire Crime Classification Officer, prove that my conviction related to possessing a handgun near a school that would have been considered a public school under New Hampshire law. Then someone comes running in and claims that Wisconsin law bans possession of a handgun within 50 meters of any school whatsoever, unconditionally, and why can’t we make Wisconsin law apply here? Bill claims that he’s never been a legal resident of Wisconsin and isn’t subject to its laws. What to do???
Extradition treaties generally will specify conditions to be met for them to apply. They may not cover all criminal offences, and distinguish between crimes in the host country and those in the requesting country. Criminal convictions, on the other hand, may be considered if they meet conditions such as sentenced to a period in prison of not less than 3 years or whatever the jurisdiction of the person’s residence may decide.
That may be unclear, but what I mean is that nation state extradition requirements have different measures than those required for convictions, whether to disenfranchise someone or disqualify them from owning a firearm or place them on a sex offenders’ register.
If I was to be convicted of engaging in sexual intercourse with a person aged under 18 in a state or country where that is the age of consent, would I have to register as a sex offender in my home country where the age of consent is 16 years? I don’t know and I think the answer is probably in the “it depends” range, just as it would be for the US citizen mentioned above.
Or, if, say, a citizen of a Western country were to be arrested and convicted of garden-variety adultery in an Islamic country where they actually prosecute people for consensual sex outside of marriage where everyone is over 18. Get home, have to register as a sex offender? Has that ever happened?
From your cite, " Whenever it is made known to the President that any citizen of the United States has been unjustly deprived of his liberty by or under the authority of any foreign government, it shall be the duty of the President forthwith to demand of that government the reasons of such imprisonment…"
I guess that word ‘unjustly’ would be the sticking point. The guy knowingly and admittedly broke the law. Is his imprisonment still unjust? If it’s not, does the US government still owe the citizen the intervention?
Well, if the imprisonment looks to be “unjust”, the only obligation on the US authorities is to ask the arresting authorities the reasons for the imprisonment. They have no obligation to go to the point of demanding the release of the citizen and/or attempting to obtain or effectuate that release unless it appears that the arrest is “wrongful and in violation of the rights of American citizenship”. And of course there’s absolutely nothing inherent in the notion of American citizenship which says that American citizens can break the law in other countries, and that being arrested for doing so is a violation of their rights.
Your rights as an American citizen arrested in, e.g., North Korea are (a) a right to access the consular services provided by your government, and (b) a right to be imprisoned and tried on terms which at least comply with the minimal standard imposed by International Law - and they really are pretty minimal.
They certainly don’t extend to a right to be acquitted and released if what you did would not be a crime if done in the US. So if you have in fact broken the law in North Korea, provided you are being detained in humane conditions and you are getting a trial on the charges you face the quoted law does not require the US authorities to obtain or effectuate your release. For political reasons they may choose to do so, or at least to try, but they have no obligation to.