Court Opinion

ID: 9489247
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 13:10:02.71924+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:53:25.061028
License: Public Domain

BARKETT, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I disagree with the majority’s conclusion that the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida had no jurisdiction to entertain this matter. I find persuasive Judge Noonan’s dissenting view in United States v. Evans, 62 F.3d 1233 (9th Cir. 1995), that the territorial nature of the relation of magistrate judges to Article III judges should lead us to a different conclusion.1 Id. at 1239. It seems sensible that appellate review of a magistrate’s decision should be had to the district court which appointed the magistrate, and then to the appellate court of the circuit in which the magistrate and district court exist. Id. at 1240.
If not totally improbable it is at least unlikely that Congress intended to vary the territorial hierarchy and place appellate review in a district court and court of appeals far removed from the place of the original decision.
Id. Otherwise, the goal of promptness in bail rulings, which § 3145 mandates, is frustrated. Id. at 1239.
I also agree with Judge Noonan that most of the “factors that should be considered by a judicial officer in granting bail as specified in 18 U.S.C. s 3142(g)____such as the person’s ‘character, family ties, employment, financial condition, length of residence, community ties’ are best determined by the court in which the person is apprehended if the person happens, as is the case here, to be a resident of the district in which apprehended.” Id.
I believe the district court incorrectly decided that it had no jurisdiction. This court should stay Torres’ removal and remand to the district court for a proper hearing on the merits of the government’s appeal of the pretrial release order.

. I would also note that the majority in Evans found that 18 U.S.C. § 3145, which provides for review of a magistrate judge’s pre-trial order in “the court having original jurisdiction over the offense,” was ambiguous precisely because all federal district courts have original jurisdiction over federal offenses pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 3231, and based its holding on venue. Evans, 62 F.3d at 1236-37. Section 3231 provides that
[t]he district courts of the United States shall have original jurisdiction, exclusive of the courts of the States, of all offenses against the laws of the United States.
18 U.S.C. § 3231.