Jim Schutze writes, Running to Mexico: Smart Idea If Life In Prison Looks Good
Two key concepts are at work. The first is extradition: Mexico, Canada and most other countries that do not support the death penalty won’t extradite to a country that does have the death penalty unless the receiving country agrees to take death off the table for the person to be sent back. So if you are that person and you flee, you’ve got a whole country as a free law firm jaw-boning the U.S. to promise not to kill you or they won’t extradite.
The second factor, however, is more ancient and possibly more fundamental. The key concept there is fleeing. Generally speaking, fleeing is taken as a strong indication of guilt. Tom Mills, a top Texas criminal defense lawyer, said, “I think there may even be passages in the Bible about that.”
And,
David Finn, another top criminal defense lawyer who has worked with extradition, told me that the skedaddle to Mexico begins to look a whole lot less smart when you make two mistakes: 1) Ask your mom and dad for help (Ethan Couch), or 2) Are not a Mexican yourself.
Schutze advises to lawyer up. Better yet, don’t commit the crime. [See update below]
In other crime stories, Ildefonso Ortiz and Brandon Darby report on a Cartel Cover-Up: Mexican Authorities Claim They Can’t Distinguish Human Remains from Chicken Bones
Forensic technicians in this border state reached an unprecedented level of incompetence or complicity in helping the state government cover-up the discovery of a clandestine grave by claiming they are unable to distinguish between human bones and animal bones such as those of cows and chickens after the discovery of a clandestine grave less than 100 yards from the Texas-Mexico border. The same forensic techs are the ones that are tasked with going over violent crime scenes in this border state.
The claims were made on Monday by the Tamaulipas government when they tried to coverup the scope of a cartel incineration operation near the Texas border. Breitbart Texasand Mexico’s El Manana Newspaper had documented the finding of the clandestine crematorium or clandestine narco-gravesite just south of the border with Texas.
. . .
The days of silence and then the release of a government “official” version follows the same narrative that Mexico’s federal government tried to push last year by claiming that 43 education students from the town of Ayotzinapa, Guerrero had been kidnapped by police officers and then turned over to cartel members who murdered them and incinerated the remains in a landfill in that southern Mexican state. The “official” government narrative has since been discredited by international teams of forensic experts that have spent months researching the landfill in that Mexican state and claim that a fire strong enough to have incinerated 43 bodies could not have taken place in that region.
UPDATE
Later today a reader pointed out that entering Mexico illegally is considered a felony, in addition to fleeing a crime in the U.S. It is not. According to this report (emphasis added),
In April 2008, the Mexican Congress unanimously approved legislation eliminating the felony criminal penalty for entering Mexico without proper travel documents or remainning in the country after one’s visa expired. Illegal migration had been punishable by up to 10 years in prison but the 2008 amendment demoted the felony offense to an administrative infraction with a fine of up to 5,000 pesos ($400).
