Ker v. People of the State of Illinois
| Decision Date | 06 December 1886 |
| Citation | 30 L.Ed. 421,7 S.Ct. 225,119 U.S. 436 |
| Parties | KER v. PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
C. Stuart Beattie, for plaintiff in error.
Geo. Hunt, Atty. Gen. of Illinois, for defendant in error.
This case is brought here by a writ of error to the supreme court of the tate of Illinois. The plaintiff in error, Frederick M. Ker, was indicted, tried, and convicted in the criminal court of Cook county, in that state, for larceny. The indictment also included charges of embezzlement. During the proceedings connected with the trial the defendant presented a plea in abatement, which, on demurrer, was overruled; and, the defendant refusing to plead further, a plea of not guilty was entered for him, according to the statute of that state, by order of the court, on which the trial and conviction took place.
The substance of the plea in abatement, which is a very long one, is that the defendant, being in the city of Lima, in Peru, after the offenses were charged to have been committed, was in fact kidnaped and brought to this country against his will. His statement is that, application having been made by the parties who were injured, Gov. Hamilton, of Illinois, made his requisition, in writing, to the secretary of state of the United States for a warrant requesting the extradition of the defendant, by the executive of the republic of Peru, from that country to Cook county; that on the first day of March, 1883, the president of the United States issued his warrant, in due form, directed to Henry G. Julian, as messenger, to receive the defendant from the authorities of Peru, upon a charge of larceny, in compliance with the treaty between the United States and Peru on that subject; that the said Julian, having the necessary papers with him, arrived in Lima, but, without presenting them to any officer of the Peruvian government, or making any demand on that government for the surrender of Ker, forcibly and with violence arrested him, placed him on board the United States vessel Essex, in the harbor of Callao, kept him a close prisoner until the arrival of that vessel at Honolulu, where, after some detention, he was transferred, in the same forcible manner, on board another vessel, to-wit, the City of Sydney, in which he was carried a prisoner to San Francisco, in the state of California. The plea then states, that, before his arrival in that city, Gov. Hamilton had made a requisition on the governor of California, under the laws and constitution of the United States, for the delivery up of the defendant as a fugitive from justice, who had escaped to that state on account of the same offenses charged in the requisition on Peru and in the indictment in this case. This requisition arrived, as the plea states, and was presented to the governor of California, who made his order for the surrender of the defendant to the person appointed by the governor of Illinois, namely, one Frank Warner, on the twenty-fifth day of June, 1883. The defendant arrived in the city of San Francisco on the ninth day of July thereafter, and was immediately placed in the custody of Warner, under the order of the governor of California, and, still a prisoner, was transferred by him to Cook county, where the process of the criminal count was served upon him, and he was held to answer the indictment already mentioned.
The plea is very full of averments that the defendant protested, and was refused any opportunity whatever, from the time of his arrest in Lima until he was delivered over to the authorities of Cook county, of communicating with any person, or seeking any advice or assistance in regard to procuring his release by legal process or otherwise; and he alleges that this proceeding is a violation of the provisions of the treaty between the United States and Peru, negotiated in 1870, which was finally ratified by the two governments, and proclaimed by the president of the United States, July 27, 1874. 18 U. S. St. at Large, pt. 3, p. 35.
The judgment of the criminal court of Cook county, Illinois, was carried by writ of error to the supreme court of that state, and there affirmed, to which judgment the present writ of error is directed. The assignments of error made here are as follows: 'First, that said supreme court of Illinois erred in aff rming the judgment of said criminal court of Cook county, sustaining the demurrer to plaintiff in error's plea to the jurisdiction of said criminal court; second, that said supreme court of Illinois erred in its judgment aforesaid, in failing to enforce the full faith and credit of the federal treaty with the republic of Peru, invoked by plaintiff in error in his said plea to the jurisdiction of said criminal court.
The grounds upon which the jurisdiction of this court is invoked may be said to be three, though from the briefs and arguments of counsel it is doubtful whether, in point of fact, more than one is relied upon. It is contended, in several places in the brief, that the proceedings in the arrest in Peru, and the extradition and delivery to the authorities of Cook county, were not 'due process of law;' and we may suppose, although it is not so alleged, that this reference is to that clause of article 14 of the amendments to the constitution of the United States which declares that no state shall deprive any person of life, liberty, or property 'without due process of law.' The 'due process of law' here guarantied is complied with when the party is regularly indicted by the proper grand jury in the state court, has a trial according to the forms and modes prescribed for such trials, and when, in that trial and proceedings, he is deprived of no rights to which he is lawfully entitled. We do not intend to say that there may not be proceedings previous to the trial, in regard to which the prisoner could invoke in some manner the provisions of this clause of the constitution; but, for mere irregularities in the manner in which he may be brought into custody of the law, we do not think he is entitled to say that he should not be tried at all for the crime with which he is charged in a regular indictment. He may be arrested for a very heinous offense by persons without any warrant, or without any previous complaint, and brought before a proper officer; and this may be, in some sense, said to be 'without due process of law.' But it would hardly be claimed that, after the case had been investigated and the defendant held by the proper authorities to answer for the crime, he could plead that he was first arrested 'without due process of law.' So here, when found within the jurisdiction of the state of Illinois, and liable to answer for a crime against the laws of...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
State v. Mitchell
...1251, 63 L.Ed.2d 537 (1980); Frisbie v. Collins, 342 U.S. 519, 522, 72 S.Ct. 509, 511, 96 L.Ed. 541 (1952); Ker v. Illinois, 119 U.S. 436, 440, 7 S.Ct. 225, 227, 30 L.Ed. 421 (1886); State v. Fleming, supra, 198 Conn. 262-63, 502 A.2d The adversarial probable cause hearing at issue here, on......
-
Henretty v. Jones
...United States v. Lopez, 542 F.2d 283 (5th Cir. 1976); United States v. Lara, 539 F.2d 495 (5th Cir. 1976); Ker v. Illinois, 119 U.S. 436, 7 S. Ct. 225, 30 L. Ed. 421 (1886), Frisbie v. Collins, 342 U.S. 519, 72 S. Ct. 509, 96 L. Ed. 541 (1952), Lascelles v. Georgia, 148 U.S. 537, 13 S. Ct. ......
-
State v. Ostroski
...519, 522, 72 S.Ct. 509, 511, 96 L.Ed. 541, reh. denied, 343 U.S. 937, 72 S.Ct. 768, 96 L.Ed. 1344 (1952); Ker v. Illinois, 119 U.S. 436, 440, 7 S.Ct. 225, 227, 30 L.Ed. 421 (1886). 10 Federal law, Page 926 provides no basis for the defendant's argument that his motions to dismiss should hav......
-
Commonwealth ex rel. Master v. Baldi
... ... Pennsylvania from a race track in the State of Maryland by ... detectives from the Philadelphia Bureau of Police; (2) that ... he was ... Pettibone v. Nichols, 203 U.S. 192, 27 ... S.Ct. 111, 51 L.Ed. 148; Ker v. Illinois, 119 U.S ... 436, 7 S.Ct. 225, 30 L.Ed. 421; Mahon v. Justice, ... 127 U.S. 700, 8 S.Ct ... Ex ... parte Tom Tong , 108 U.S. 556, 2 S.Ct. 871, 27 L.Ed. 826; ... People ex rel. Ross v. Ragen , 391 Ill. 419, 63 ... N.E.2d 874, 875; Sadler, Criminal Procedure in ... ...
-
Judicial integrity: a call for its re-emergence in the adjudication of criminal cases.
...the court's jurisdiction to proceed with a criminal case). This principle is regarded as the Ker/Frisbie rule from Ker v. Illinois, 119 U.S. 436 (1886) and Frisbie v. Collins, 342 U.S. 519 (1952). Although a possible exception to this rule was suggested in United States v. Toscanino, 500 F.......
-
Fourth amendment primer
...of the case is not a remedy. Gerstein v. Pugh , 420 U. S. 103, 119 (1975); Frisbie v. Collins , 342 U. S. 519 (1952); Ker v. Illinois , 119 U. S. 436 (1886). However, any evidence seized from the person is suppressible as the fruit of the poisonous tree. As with most rules, there are except......
-
Fourth amendment primer
...of the case is not a remedy. Gerstein v. Pugh , 420 U. S. 103, 119 (1975); Frisbie v. Collins , 342 U. S. 519 (1952); Ker v. Illinois , 119 U. S. 436 (1886). However, any evidence seized from the person is suppressible as the fruit of the poisonous tree. As with most rules, there are except......
-
Fourth Amendment Primer
...of the case is not a remedy. Gerstein v. Pugh , 420 U. S. 103, 119 (1975); Frisbie v. Collins , 342 U. S. 519 (1952); Ker v. Illinois , 119 U. S. 436 (1886). However, any evidence seized from the person is suppressible as the fruit of the poisonous tree. As with most rules, there are except......