[Cboldt]

I've been carrying on a brief discussion with Ken at popehat.com, and he points out that my construction of the transfer (to adult trial) statute was incorrect. The Court has discretion to permit the statute even on a first offense, provided the charged offense is a "crime of violence" as defined in 18 USC 16. A bomb threat hoax is a crime of violence, because it is an offense that has as an element the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against the person or property of another.

This also takes care of the certification, or taking the case out of the hands of the state. Under 18 USC 5032, the feds are required to allege (3) the offense charged is a crime of violence that is a felony [check, this one is] and that there is a substantial Federal interest in the case or the offense to warrant the exercise of Federal jurisdiction [this seems to be a question of discretion in juvenile bomb threat hoaxes, seeing as how so many of them are perpetrated each year].

It's entirely conceivable that the juvenile information was filed back in March, and that all delays in getting to trial are accounted for by the defendant agreeing to delay. That would leave "relocation from NC to Indiana" as an unexplained element.

[normanpubbie]

Found a phone interview by Mrs. Lundeby on the Alex Jones radio program dated May 4 (before the U.S. Attorney's May 7 "clarification" statement). The interview is linked here. The interview is over 20 minutes long; most of the time is devoted to Jones's ranting. Mrs. Lundeby is in the conversation for three periods, 4:58 to 8:00, 9:48 to 14:51, and 18:45 to 21:45.

Information she provided in the interview included:

1. Authorities prevented her from contacting an attorney during the search of the premises.
2. She was given a copy of the search warrant when the warrant was served.
3. She had to go to detention (I assume she meant the detention hearing) at 10 AM on March 6.
4. Assistant U.S. Attorney Hayes (sp?) in the South Bend office is handling the case.
5. She apparently has engaged a private attorney and Ashton has been assigned a public defender.
6. The May 22 hearing is to determine whether Ashton will be transferred to adult status.

We still don't know exactly when the "juvenile information" charging document was issued. The Feds may well have prepared it beforehand and presented it at the initial/detention hearing on March 6. They doubtless put Lundeby's initial/detention hearing on the court docket before March 6. Part of the reason for the 18-day delay between the bomb threat and the initial/detention hearing may have been because they could not get an earlier court date.

At some point in time the judge had to give authorization for the Feds to relocate young Lundeby to Indiana. Since the May 7 statement by Capps identified only one NC hearing, the relocation authorization may have been obtained on March 6. We still do not know when the relocation took place but since two hearings have been held in Indiana, it was probably soon after the March 6 hearing.

I still maintain that the move to Indiana was appropriate because in this country people are tried in the jurisdiction where the crime took place unless the judge subsequently approves a change of venue.