In re Behrendt

• Decision Date: 29 December 1884
• Citation: 22 F. 699
• Parties: In re BEHRENDT.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

22 F. 699

In re BEHRENDT.

United States Circuit Court, S.D. New York.

December 29, 1884

A. L Sanger, for petitioner.

Edward Salomon, for the Prussian government.

BROWN J.

The petitioner, Behrendt, having been held by the United States commissioner for extradition to Prussia, on a charge of forgery, under the treaty of June 16, 1852, has been brought before me upon habeas corpus, together with a record of the proceedings under a writ of certiorari. The discharge of the prisoner is sought upon two grounds: that the evidence of forgery is insufficient to hold him; and that the documentary proof received by the commissioner is not properly authenticated. The evidence of criminality is drawn wholly from the documentary proofs, consisting of depositions taken in Prussia. These depositions purport to be taken in penal or criminal proceedings against the petitioner there; and in some of the papers it is expressly stated that they are taken in a criminal court, and on the charge of forgery. These proceedings are certified by the royal Prussian judge of the court at Marienburg, who certifies that 'this judicial proceeding, with respect to its form, is valid evidence according to the laws existing in Prussia. ' The signatures are certified, as required by the act of August 3 1882, Sec. 5, and the whole is finally authenticated by the United States minister at Berlin, who certifies that the signatures are genuine; that the documents are entitled to full faith and credit; and that the said 'documents which are intended to be offered in evidence upon the hearing within the United States of an application for the extradition of Joseph Moses Behrendt under title 66 of the Revised Statutes of the said United States, and for all the purposes of such hearing, are properly and legally authenticated, so as to entitle them to be received for similar purposes by the tribunals of Prussia.'

Section 5 of the act of August 3, 1882, restores in substance the provisions of the act of June 22, 1860, (12 St.at Large, 84,) as respects the mode of authentication, and supersedes the provisions on that subject of section 5271 of the Revised Statutes, as well as those of the act of June 19, 1876, (19 St.at Large, 59.) The certificate of the royal judge that the judicial proceeding certified to 'is valid evidence according to the laws existing in Prussia,' reasonably interpreted, can mean nothing less than that, according to...