For some reason, the local Chicago police interrogate Mark Warren/Roberts/Sheridan about the NYC murder. Mark denies any involvement in that crime. Then, apparently, the Chicago cops load Mark onto a plane to New York City.
Strapped into that doomed plane, eyeing the assassin across the aisle gearing up for Plot Point I, Mark is in the process of extradition. Extradition happens when a person is taken by the state from his current location, and transferred to a new jurisdiction to face criminal charges there.
This is a moment of bad law on film because the Illinois Criminal Procedure statute requires an extradition request to be heard before a local judge. The local hearing is an important procedural safeguard. The accused can demand a lawyer, challenge his arrest, and file a habeas corpus petition, all before the state that has accused him can take custody of him. See 725 ILCS 225 Section 10:
No person arrested upon such warrant shall be delivered over to the agent whom the Executive Authority demanding him shall have appointed to receive him unless he shall first be taken forthwith before a judge of the circuit court of the county wherein he is arrested who shall inform him of the demand made for his surrender and of the crime with which he is charged, and that he has the right to demand and procure within a reasonable time and opportunity, not less than 24 hours, legal counsel; and if the prisoner or his counsel shall state that he or they desire to test the legality of his arrest, the judge of such court shall fix a reasonable time to be allowed him within which to apply for relief by habeas corpus.
There would also be practical problems if the cops could just stick Mark on the next flight out of town. People regularly get lost in the court system while being held inside a single building. Criminal court record-keeping would become utter chaos if any sheriff could ship out his baddies to some other jurisdiction on the basis of just a fingerprint match. Incarcerated persons would inevitably become separated from their records, and the courts receiving them would have great difficulty matching defendants with arrest warrants, without legal processes tracking the basis for the arrest with the individual accused and the charges on which the arrest was made. Meanwhile, Mark's criminal charges in Chicago would still be open, while he fails to make his court appearances, because he was shipped out on a plane with no process.As a matter of screenwriting, Mark's immediate illegal extradition is understandable. U.S. Marshals is an action movie that gets going when that plane crashes, and a courtroom scene with foregone results doesn't help us get into the action any sooner. And it's possible (maybe) that Mark has been to court and that all due process burdens were met offscreen. But the Chicago cops statements in the interrogation room suggest that Mark is taken straight from the police station to the airplane. Also Mark's story is intercut with scenes from a fugitive apprehension by U.S. Marshal Sam Gerard (Tommy Lee Jones), and Gerard's boarding the same plane, which suggests a timeline too truncated for any typical criminal court process to occur.
Besides, what's the hurry? The murders in Manhattan seem to have occurred months ago, and are not alleged to be part of some serial killing spree. The community's interest in arresting the right guy for the murders outweighs the Chicago PD's irrational impulse to just get Mark on that doomed plane with Sam Gerard.
Ultimately, the portrayal in this movie of a police department unconcerned with criminal justice may be on the money. But it disturbs me that Mark's demand for a lawyer in the interrogation room is laughed away by the police. In fact, they apparently respond to his demand for a lawyer by shipping him off to the airport then and there, as if punishing his attempt to exercise his Sixth Amendment rights. That's the bad law in this film. Mark does exactly what an accused person in police custody should do to protect his legal rights -- he refuses to talk about the events leading to his arrest, and he demands a lawyer. But in this piece of cop porn, his assertion of his rights appears to lead to a thrilling cross-country cat-and-mouse chase with Big Dog Sam Gerard.
U.S. Marshals on IMDB
