Why Do United States Fugitives Try to Flee Across the Border Into Mexico? Talal Al-Khatib - Discovery | |
go to original July 2, 2015 |
Criminals can manage to sneak across the border, but that doesn’t mean they won’t be picked up and brought back to the United States. (Discovery)
After breaking out of Clinton Correctional Facility in New York more than three weeks ago, fugitives David Sweat and Richard Matt intended to spend the rest of their days as free men in Mexico.
Their scheme, which involved murdering the husband of an accomplice and taking his car south of the border, fell apart as a result of weak planning and a strong police response. Matt died in a shootout with police, and Sweat is currently recovering from injuries in a state hospital before he is sent back to prison.
Criminal actions of these men aside, no doubt their prison break showed a high level of ingenuity. So why was their plan for after their escape, hiding away in Mexico, so cliché?
One possible explanation is the common mistaken belief that the United States and Mexico do not have an extradition treaty. Under that assumption, any American felon who manages to step across the border would not have to worry about setting foot in prison ever again.
In truth, the United States and Mexico do have a bilateral extradition treaty, first signed in 1978. Since the early 2000s, the number of fugitives that Mexico has sent back to U.S. authorities has increased at a steady pace. Between 2003 and 2011, more than 2,000 criminals were captured and returned to the United States for prosecution, according to U.S. Marshals data.
Once criminals cross the border successfully, they may think themselves in the clear, but the federal government has means of tracking them to determine where they’ve been and where they might be going. Cameras, face-detection technology and license plate readers along the border can identify fugitives and their vehicles. Most non-Mexican criminals tend to stay close to the border after all, as they’re more likely to stand out as they travel deeper into Mexican territory.
Criminals also may sabotage their own efforts at escape by using technology, particularly when their devices give away their whereabouts.
Read the rest at Discovery
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