Carchman, Mercer County Prosecutor v. Nash (473 U.S. 716)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided July 2, 1985 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 473 U.S. 716 · 105 S. Ct. 3401
- Decided
- July 2, 1985
- Term
- October Term 1984
- Vote
- 6–3
- Majority author
- Justice Blackmun
- Issue area
- Criminal Procedure
- Disposition
- Reversed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice Blackmun delivered the opinion of the Court. Article III of the Interstate Agreement on Detainers gives a prisoner incarcerated in one State the right to demand the speedy disposition of “any untried indictment, information or complaint” that is the basis of a detainer lodged against him by another State. These cases present the issue whether Art. Ill applies to detainers based on probation-violation charges. I The Interstate Agreement on Detainers (Agreement) is a compact among 48 States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and the United States. The Agreement was drafted in 1956 by the Council of State Governments and was adopted in 1958 by the State of New Jersey, where it is now codified as N. J. Stat. Ann. §2A:159A-1 et seq. (West 1971). The Agreement is a congressionally sanctioned interstate compact within the Compact Clause, U. S. Const., Art. I, §10, cl. 3, and thus is a federal law subject to federal construction. Cuyler v. Adams, 449 U. S. 433, 438-442 (1981). A detainer is a request filed by a criminal justice agency with the institution in which a prisoner is incarcerated, asking the institution either to hold the prisoner for the agency or to notify the agency when release of the prisoner is imminent. See id., at 436, n. 3 (citing and quoting H. R. Rep. No. 91-1018, p. 2 (1970), and S. Rep. No. 91-1356, p. 2 (1970)); United States…
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