Why don't rich people run to a country with no extradition if they know US authorities are about to arrest them?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

With the main news item the past few days being the arrest of disgraced crypto exchange operator Sam Bankman-Fried I got to wondering why he was sitting somewhere he was likely to be arrested?

He faces up to over 100 years of prison time. He may not get that much but he will likely spend the better part of his life in prison.

While a lot of his paper fortune was wiped out I would think he would have squirreled away a few million here and there. Once the jig was up and it was apparent US authorities were circling why on earth would he not get the hell out of Dodge? Go somewhere that will give the finger to US law enforcement.

Yet he just stayed were he was and got arrested. Not only that, he was denied bail as a flight risk. Why didn’t he run when he had the chance?

The director Roman Polanski pulled this off. So it seems doable.

(NOTE: I am not hoping these people escape justice, I am just wondering why so often they don’t.)

2

For one thing, the selection of countries with no extradition treaty is not immediately appealing.

List of United States extradition treaties - Wikipedia.

It’s a long and complicated saga, but he didn’t escape U.S. justice by moving to a country without an extradition treaty.

3

A country can choose to extradite a person, even if there is no extradition treaty. If it’s politically convenient, the country may choose to do so. And the US has ways to make it politically convenient: arms deals, foreign aid agreements, and so on. Going to a country without an extradition treaty just means that you’re gambling that the government of that country will never be persuaded to give you up.

Polanski is different. He fled to France, which has a long-standing policy of not extraditing its own citizens. France offered to try him in the French courts, applying US law, but the US declined.

However, when he was arrested in Zurich, the Swiss courts refused extradition, on the basis that they were not satisfied with the documents presented by the US on the key issue of the significance of the pre-trial detention of Polanski in California, as summarised in Wikipedia:

In a press conference held by Swiss Justice Minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, she stated that Polanski’s extradition to the U.S. was rejected, in part, because U.S. officials failed to produce certain documents, specifically “confidential testimony from a January 2010 hearing on Mr. Polanski’s original sentencing agreement”. According to Swiss officials, the records were required to determine if Polanski’s 42-day court-ordered psychiatric evaluation at Chino State Prison constituted Polanski’s whole sentence according to the now-deceased Judge Rittenband. They reasoned that if this was the correct understanding, then “Roman Polanski would actually have already served his sentence and therefore both the proceedings on which the U.S. extradition request is founded and the request itself would have no foundation.”

A similar issue arose in Poland, and the Polish courts ruled that too much time had passed for extradition:

On November 27, 2015, Poland decided it will not extradite Polanski to the U.S. after prosecutors declined to challenge the court’s ruling, agreeing that Polanski had served his punishment and did not need to face a U.S. court again. Preparations for a movie he was working on had been stalled by the extradition request from last year.[126]

On December 6, 2016, the Supreme Court of Poland ruled to reject an appeal filed by Polish Minister of Justice Ziobro, and to uphold the October 2015 ruling.[127]

4

It was reported a month ago that SBF and other FTZ personnel were “under supervision” in the Bahamas, meaning he might not have been able to flee even if he had wanted to.

5

I dunno…I think living in Taiwan or China or Qatar or Saudi Arabia is better than jail if you have a lot of money. There are probably some idyllic islands in Indonesia to hang out on.

YMMV

6

The days when someone like Robert Vesco could jump from beautiful Caribbean nation to another beautiful Caribbean nation to avoid the Feds are pretty much over. (In fact, Vesco himself is the reason several of those countries tightened up their laws.)

Here’s a handy map of countries with and without extradition agreements with the U.S. As Riemann says, they aren’t the most appealing. On top of that, most of the non-extradition countries at least have diplomatic relations with the U.S., and may not welcome Americans on the run, treaty or no.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-without-extradition

7

This, for sure.

If you combine “doesn’t have a current extradition treaty with the U.S.” with “and is unlikely to want to cooperate with the U.S. any time in the foreseeable future to extradite my criminal self,” it’s probably a very short list: North Korea, Russia (probably), maybe Saudi Arabia, maybe a few countries in African and east Asia.

Rich people who would be fleeing arrest would also likely want to continue to enjoy the perks of living as a rich person in a civilized, comfortable country. Unless you are just ridiculously wealthy – enough so to buy your own well-fortified island or something – any place where you are going to be 99+% safe from extradition is probably also going to be a place where you’re living in the boondocks, and/or living under a capricious totalitarian leader.

8

It’s not the same thing exactly, but while OBL was holed up in Abbottabad he wasn’t exactly enjoying living large.

9

Given that the US spent huge amounts on intelligence efforts over years and sent SEAL teams and invaded another country (if only for a few hours) to get OBL it is clear his only safety was staying utterly off the grid.

The only other person I can think the US tried REALLY hard to get back was Edward Snowden. They forced a diplomatic jet to land and went on the plane to get him (violating usual diplomatic sovereignty rules but he wasn’t there).

I think if Snowden was almost anywhere other than Russia the US would be sending military forces after him.

I doubt Bankman-Fried would merit that level of effort.

10

I quite agree.

But at the same time, if SBF chose to live large in e.g. Indonesia he’d be located pretty quickly by DOJ’s computers. He’d not have to worry about stealthy UH-60s full of SEALs, but it would probably not be long before the US leaned on Indonesia to pick him up.

So his goal, just like OBLs, would have to be to lie so low that he doesn’t leave a footprint big enough to be found. And with no idea how hard they’re trying or what resources they can bring to bear looking for you. You or I might be happy enough living the life of a middle class US expat, spending $75K/yr on rice, fish, booze, and young women. He’d probably have a hard time living quite that small.


Another side to the psychology may be something like “I’m so cool and so smart they can’t hammer me.” It’s cognitive dissonance, but people who have extraordinary lives generally have extraordinary psychologies.

11

A lot of them either don’t believe they have committed a crime (they just exploited a legal loophole), think their lawyers will get them off, or think the punishment will at most be a fine/probation.

12

Doesn’t Israel refuse to extradite any Jews? IIRC some young man murdered someone in Maryland and fled to Israel (this was in the 80’s or 90’s so dim memory of it). The US wanted him back but Israel refused. Israel was not happy at being used as a loophole like this but that was their policy.

Does that still exist? I think SBF is Jewish.

ETA: It seems it does:

Also, I found the case I referenced above: Samuel Sheinbein - Wikipedia It seems extradition laws in Israel have changed because of that so SBF probably would not be protected there. It seems complicated.

13

You can live quite well in Vietnam or Cambodia at a fraction of what it would cost in the US or Europe.

14

As far as I know, Israel will resist extraditing their own citizens, not necessarily any/all people of Jewish descent. I would think any loophole would necessarily involve some kind of dual citizenship. But even there, they would lean on the idea they’re protecting the rights of one of their own citizens rather than Jewish people in general.

Looks like the article backs that up. The people involved at least had Israeli passports and outright citizenship. Simply being (or holding oneself out to be) Jewish does not seem to be enough. Sheinbein sort of got around that but by virtue of a father who already had Israeli citizenship. I have some friends who were investigating a potential right to return status and there are several hoops to jump through (including validation through rabbis), moreso if one is not related to a current citizen.

As for non-extradition countries, it’s better to consider them not-necessarily-extradition countries. If such a country decides it is in its own best interests to turn a US citizen over to the US, there’s not a lot stopping them.

15

You can run away and live at the absolute mercy of an unfriendly government who will turn you over to US authorities the moment it makes sense for them to do so.

Or you can gamble on the criminal justice system treating you the way it treats most wealthy people in this country. That means finding a way to make an attractive deal with the feds, serving a minimal sentence (maybe avoiding jail time altogether), and coming out with enough clean money squirreled away to live out your days in comfort.

And since the general rule in America is “rich people get away with it,” it’s not insane to spend your time mitigating the weight of the inevitable hammer rather than running to Cambodia or wherever.

16

More specifically, France does not extradite French citizens for prosecution by other countries (in general, I’m sure there are exceptions), and Polanski’s crimes were not considered particularly egregious by the French public. However, Polanski is very limited in terms of where he can travel to; when he went to Switzerland in 2009 he was arrested by Swiss authorities (despite having travelled there previously without restraint), so he’s basically limited to travel between France and Poland.

Stranger

17

I think you win the thread. Bravo @Johnny_Bravo !

18

This seems true if it is something they all kinda do because they don’t want to set a precedent.

But, if you piss off the powers that be you end in jail pretty fast. Bernie Madoff lost a lot of very rich people a lot of money. He was in jail very fast as these things go.

The government and the powerful investment houses and banks are not keen on crypto. They have been explicit in their disdain for it and it seems to really bug them. SBF has no powerful friends who are coming to his rescue. He was never a member of the club. I am willing to bet the government will do its best to bury him.

19

Regarding Sam Bankman-Fried in particular, his parents are both professors at Stanford and even the collapse of FTX and his arrest have been embarrassing and career-limiting enough for them. I imagine if he were to have fled prosecution, it would be the end of their careers, and possibly the beginning of their prosecution.

20

I get the feeling he is of the “numbers strong, social cues weak” sort. He may simply have never realized that failure (and arrest) were an option.