Yordi v. Nolte, 215 U.S. 227 (1909)

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Yordi v. Nolte

No. 382

Submitted October 22, 1909
Decided December 6, 1909
215 U.S. 227

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE UNITED

STATES FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS

Syllabus

In foreign extradition proceedings, the complaint is sufficient to authorize the commissioner to act if it so clearly and explicitly states a treaty crime that the accused knows exactly what the charge is; nor need the record and depositions from the demanding country be actually fastened to the complaint.

In this case, held that depositions in the possession of the officer of the demanding country making the complaint, which showed actual grounds for the prosecution and of which the commissioner had knowledge from their use in a former proceeding, were admissible on the hearing before the commissioner and were also admissible for the purpose of vesting jurisdiction in him to issue the warrant.

166 F. 921 affirmed.

Pablo Yordi, being detained in custody by the United States Marshal of the Western District of Texas, obtained from the District Court for that district a writ of habeas corpus to secure his release. He was charged in the Republic of Mexico with the crime of "fraud and forgery of documents," and a warrant for his arrest was duly issued by the criminal judge of the City of Guadalajara. He avoided arrest in Mexico and fled to El Paso, Texas, where he was detained in prison, under an order of the United States commissioner, awaiting the issue by the proper authorities of an order for his extradition.

At the hearing on the habeas corpus, it was stipulated that the crimes in the complaint made before the United States commissioner were extraditable offenses under the existing treaty between the United States and Mexico; that, at the time of the hearing before the commissioner, the complaint in the case, made by A. V. Lomeli, Consul of Mexico, was solely upon information and belief; that he had no actual or personal knowledge of the commission of any offense, but, at the time of making the complaint, the said Mexican Consul had before him the record and depositions of the witnesses of the republic of Mexico in the proceedings before the Criminal Judge of Guadalajara.

There were three complaints made against Yordi. The first, made by the assistant United States attorney, was dismissed. The second and third were made by the Mexican Consul.

Upon the hearing under the first complaint, the record and evidence contained in the proceedings in Mexico were introduced in evidence before the commissioner, as they were also on the hearing on the second complaint. The commissioner found that there was probable cause to believe Yordi guilty of the offense of uttering a forged instrument in the State of Jalisco, United States of Mexico, on or about the twenty-sixth day of May, 1908, and that there was also probable cause to believe Yordi had committed the offense of obtaining money by means of false device in the Mexican state mentioned. The commissioner therefore ordered Yordi to be held for extradition to the Republic of Mexico on the charges alleged in the third and fourth counts of the complaint, and that he be committed to the county jail of El Paso County, Texas, to await the action of the proper authorities in the City of Washington, upon demand for his extradition to the Republic of Mexico.

The case was heard before Maxey, District Judge, who discharged the writ of habeas corpus and required the marshal to hold the petitioner in custody until a warrant of extradition was duly issued. From this final order, this appeal was taken. Judge Maxey’s opinion is reported in 166 F. 921.