Court Opinion

ID: 9698184
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 19:44:09.55444+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:39.169033
License: Public Domain

MANDERINO, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent. As noted by Mr. Justice O’Brien, the Uniform Criminal Extradition Act specifies that before a demand for extradition will be recognized, the Governor of the asylum state must receive in writing from the demanding state, inter alia, either:
(a) [a] copy of the indictment, or
(b) [an] information supported by affidavit, or
(c) an affidavit made before a magistrate together with a copy of any warrant issued pursuant thereto, or
(d) [a] copy of a judgment of conviction or of sentence imposed together with a statement from the executive authority of the demanding state that the person named has escaped from prison or has breached the terms of his bail, probation or parole.
The Act’s requirement of an affidavit in support of an information, or “an affidavit made before a magistrate there, together with a copy of any warrant [issued pursuant thereto]” is meant to provide the asylum state with sufficient facts from which it can determine whether the infor*314mation or the warrant is based on probable cause. The requirement, otherwise, is meaningless.
Neither the affidavit accompanying the information, nor the affidavit supporting the warrant issued by the Kansas magistrate provide sufficient facts from which we can determine whether probable cause exists for appellant’s arrest. They are not the affidavits required by the Act.
If the Governor of Pennsylvania were to submit to the judicial branch the same documents submitted in this case and request the arrest of a Pennsylvania citizen for a Pennsylvania crime, there would not be sufficient facts to establish probable cause for the issuance of a warrant. Neither the state nor the federal constitution nor any statute requires that we deprive a citizen of liberty without probable cause having been established simply because the documents are received from out-of-state.
The deprivation of liberty in this case is contrary to state and federal constitutional safeguards. I dissent.