Kidnapping-Statute of Limitations-Mississippi

Kidnapping remains a capital crime under federal law and there is no statute of limitations that would justify dismissing charges against a reputed Ku Klux Klansman accused in the 1964 slayings of two black men, say federal prosecutors. ^[1]

James Ford Seale, 71, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of kidnapping and one count of conspiracy. ^[2] Seale is being held without bond and a second man also suspected in the attack, Charles Marcus Edwards, 72, has not been charged and may be cooperating with authorities. ^[3]

Seale could be sentenced to up to life in prison if convicted. ^[4] In a motion to dismiss the charges last month, Assistant Federal Defender Kathy Nester said the government should have charged Seale under the law in effect at the time of the alleged offense. ^[5] The statute of limitations on the federal crime of kidnapping is five years, meaning the deadline to charge Seale was 1969, she argued. ^[6]

U.S. Attorney Dunn Lampton, in a response filed this week, said Seale's defense was misreading the law because while the U.S. Supreme Court in 1968 may have eliminated the death penalty for kidnapping, the court did not remove the designation of kidnapping as a capital crime under federal law. ^[7]

"The limitations period depends upon the capital nature of the crime, and not on whether the death penalty is in fact available for a defendant in a particular case and because the defendant is charged with offenses deemed by Congress to be capital in nature, he may be prosecuted for those offenses without limitation," Lampton said in the government's response. ^[8]

In a reply to the government's position, defense attorneys said once the death penalty was removed as a penalty for kidnapping, kidnapping became a non-capital offense and that the 1968 decision gave trial courts no option but to treat as non-capital cases in which the death penalty provision of a statute has been removed. ^[9] Therefore, the five-year non-capital statute of limitations must apply. ^[10]

Seale and Edwards were arrested in 1964, but the FBI - consumed by the search for three civil rights workers who had disappeared that summer - turned the case over to local authorities, who threw out all charges. ^[11]

The Justice Department reopened the case in 2000. ^[12] Kidnapping is a crime under 18 U.S.C. 1201.^[13]

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[1]Jack Elliot, Jr., Federal Prosecutor Opposes Dismissal of Charges in 1964 Killings of 2 Black Men in Mississippi, Associated Press, February 9, 2007.
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[13] U.S.C. 1201 (2005).