Title: Davis v. Rhyne
Citation: 181 Kan. 443, 312 P.2d 626
Docket Number: 40,556
State: Kansas
Issuer: Kansas Supreme Court
Date: June 8, 1957

181 Kan. 443 (1957)
312 P.2d 626
EVERETT WESLEY DAVIS, Appellant,
v.
ARDEN RHYNE, Sheriff, Leavenworth County, Kansas; and ARTHUR HOFFMAN, Warden, Kansas State Penitentiary, Lansing, Kansas, Appellees.
No. 40,556

Supreme Court of Kansas.
Opinion filed June 8, 1957.
Everett Wesley Davis, pro se.
Fred N. Six, Assistant Attorney General, of Topeka, argued the cause and John Anderson, Jr., Attorney General, of Topeka, was with him on the briefs for the respondents.
The opinion of the court was delivered by
HALL, J.:
This is an appeal from an order and judgment of the district court of Leavenworth County denying petitioner's application for a writ of habeas corpus.
Petitioner was originally charged in Russell County, Kansas, with the crime of forgery in the second degree. He was represented by court appointed counsel and pled guilty to the charge. He was subsequently sentenced to the Kansas State Penitentiary for a period of not more than 10 years for the crime of forgery in the second degree as defined by G.S. 1949, 21-608. Petitioner was sentenced on October 6, 1952, and served a year of time in the state penitentiary. On the 6th day of October, 1953, he was granted a parole by the Board of Penal Institutions. On April 21, 1954, he became a parole delinquent by reason of leaving his place of residence and employment without permission, whereupon the Warden of the penitentiary issued an order for his arrest.
Petitioner left the State of Kansas, went to Colorado, and later to Wyoming where he was convicted and sentenced to the United States Penitentiary at Leavenworth, Kansas, for violation of a federal statute. Upon his release from the United States Penitentiary at Leavenworth, petitioner was arrested by appellee, the Sheriff of *445 Leavenworth County, Kansas, by authority of the Kansas State Penitentiary parole violation warrant and has been and is now in the custody of the appellee.
Petitioner made application for a writ of habeas corpus in the district court of Leavenworth County which was denied on the 17th day of September, 1956. Hence this appeal.
Petitioner contends that the failure of the State of Kansas to extradite or return petitioner from the asylum states of Colorado and Wyoming constituted a waiver of jurisdiction over him as a parole violator and also that his rights under article IV, section 2 of the United States Constitution have been violated.
Petitioner's principal complaint is that the State of Kansas knew his whereabouts at all times and did nothing to enforce its warrant for parole violation until after petitioner was apprehended for the federal offense and that such failure by the State of Kansas waived and relinquished any and all rights it had to the petitioner. For the same reason he contends the State of Kansas violated article IV, section 2 of the United States Constitution because he was a "fugitive from justice" and the state did not extradite him.
In substantiation of these claims, petitioner includes in his brief a series of letters addressed to him from the record clerk of the Kansas Penitentiary and the pardon attorney dated in October and November of 1954, some six months after the revocation of his parole.
There is a line of cases which hold that a state which honors the requisition of another state for a prisoner in its custody for an offense waives its jurisdiction over him and thereby also waives its subsequent right to punish him for past delinquencies or to extradite him for that purpose. However, this is not the rule of the great weight of authority. The theory is that such surrender operates as a waiver of the jurisdiction of the state over the person of the prisoner and that he cannot thereafter be considered a fugitive from justice from the surrendering state. (35 C.J.S. Extradition § 21b; In re Whittington, 34 Cal. App. 344, 167 Pac. 404; The People v. Bartley, 383 Ill. 437, 50 N.E.2d 517, 147 A.L.R. 935; In re Colin, 337 Mich. 491, 60 N.W.2d 431.)
Petitioner cites and relies on one authority, In re Hess, 5 Kan. App. 763, 48 Pac. 596. This case is sometimes cited in support of the above minority rule on waiver. See In re Whittington, supra, where the court said:
The Hess case involved two defendants who were surrendered to the Kansas authorities by the State of Oklahoma. They were charged for having committed an offense against both the Oklahoma Territory and the State of Kansas. The Governor of Oklahoma turned the defendants over to Kansas. At the time of appeal the defendants were in the legal custody of Kansas but contended that Oklahoma had jurisdiction over them. The court held that Oklahoma had waived its jurisdiction.
The facts of the Hess case are clearly distinguishable from the case at bar and it has no factual application to petitioner's contention on this appeal.
As a matter of law, the Hess case has never been persuasive with this court. Although it was cited in the leading case of In re Whittington, supra, this court said in In re Martin, 142 Kan. 907, 52 P.2d 1196:
..............
The court cited People v. Mallon, 218 N.Y.S. 432, as illustrative of the weight of authority.
The Kansas cases follow the weight of authority. The rule is stated in 35 C.J.S. Extradition § 10b(2).
See, also, 42 A.L.R. 585; 78 A.L.R. 420; 93 A.L.R. 931; and 147 A.L.R. 941.
For Kansas cases see In re Martin, supra; and Ohrazada v. Turner, 164 Kan. 581, Syl. 1 &amp; 2, 190 P.2d 413, where the court said:
And in Thompson v. Nye, 174 Kan. 750, Syl. 2, 257 P.2d 937:
And in Holden v. Hudspeth, 168 Kan. 194, 211 P.2d 64, and Young v. Edmondson, 177 Kan. 582, 280 P.2d 571.
The above authorities have been cited in answer to petitioner's contention that the State of Kansas waived or relinquished its right to extradite him because of its alleged failure to enforce its warrant for parole violation whereby his constitutional rights were violated.
Under the facts of this case, we really need not be concerned with the problems of extradition under article IV, section 2 of the United States Constitution. The petitioner was returned to Kansas by federal authorities and incarcerated in the federal penitentiary at Leavenworth, Kansas. Upon release from that prison he was immediately arrested by Kansas, the demanding state, not through extradition but through the rule of comity between the states and the federal authorities. 35 C.J.S. Extradition § 2:
*448 And in 25 Am. Jur., Habeas Corpus, § 71:
And in Pettibone v. Nichols, 203 U.S. 192, 51 L. Ed. 148, 27 S. Ct. 111, 51 A.L.R. 803, it was held that while a person being extradited has a right to have the question of the validity of his extradition (as to whether he was a fugitive from justice or not) determined by a court, state or Federal, and, if found invalid, to be discharged from custody, he cannot secure his discharge upon this ground after he has been returned to the demanding state.
Under the practice of comity a prisoner on parole from a state prison who is subsequently placed on parole from a federal penitentiary is constructively a prisoner of the state, subject only to such rights as the federal authorities may assert in conforming with the rule of comity existing between the federal and state sovereignties. Where a person has violated the laws of two different sovereignties, it is up to the interested sovereignties and not the criminal, to settle which is to inflict the punishment, and by the same token, where a prisoner is on parole from two sovereignties, it is for the latter, and not the prisoner, to determine priority of jurisdiction over him in connection with paroles. The question of priority of jurisdiction is one of comity between the respective sovereignties and not one of personal right of the prisoner. (United States v. Marrin, 227 Fed. 314; United States v. Farrell, 87 F.2d 957; In Re Silverstein, 52 C.A. (2d) 725, 126 P.2d 962; and Rosenthal v. Hunter, 164 F.2d 949.)
The Kansas cases on this point are in line with the federal cases. A leading case is Perry v. Gwartney, 162 Kan. 607, 178 P.2d 185, where the court held that as between the state and Federal governments the question of which should have the custody of the defendant was one of comity between the two governments and not a personal right of the prisoner and could not be raised by him. The court quoted the following from Wall v. Hudspeth, 108 F.2d 865:
See, also, In re Martin, supra; Hostetler v. Hudspeth, 163 Kan. 647, 184 P.2d 994; Ohrazada v. Turner, supra; Powell v. Turner, 167 Kan. 524, 207 P.2d 492; Holden v. Hudspeth, supra; Foster v. Hudspeth, 170 Kan. 338, 224 P.2d 987; Hanson v. Nye, 176 Kan. 373, 270 P.2d 790.
In a recent case, Young v. Edmondson, 177 Kan. 582, 280 P.2d 571, which factually is very similar to the case at bar, this court said:
In habeas corpus proceedings, the burden is upon petitioner to prove the grounds on which he relies for his release. The court said in Engling v. Edmondson, 175 Kan. 883, 267 P.2d 487:
The district court of Leavenworth County found that petitioner had failed to meet this burden. After a very careful examination of petitioner's contentions on this appeal we must agree with the district court. The record presents no grounds for his release.
The judgment is affirmed.