[20180730]LSB10179_《劫持人质法》涵盖海外绑架勒索赎金.pdf

CRS INSIGHT Prepared for Members and Committees of Congress Legal SidebarLegal Sidebari i Hostage-Taking Statute Covers Kidnapping for Ransom Abroad July 30, 2018 In the midst of a rash of kidnappings, a U.S. citizen living in Haiti was seized and held for ransom. In United States v. Noel, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit (Eleventh Circuit) recently upheld the conviction of one of the kidnappers under the federal hostage-taking statute. The statute condemns “whoever, whether inside or outside the United States . . . detains . . . another person in order to compel a third person or a governmental organization to do or abstain from doing any act as an explicit or implicit condition for the release of the person detained . . .” It applies outside the U.S. if either the offender or the victim is a U.S. citizen; the offender later travels, or is brought, to the U.S.; or the targeted “governmental organization” is the U.S. Government. As noted below, Noel raised several challenges on appeal. He contended that: (1) the government should have been required to prove that he knew his victim was an American citizen; (2) Congress only intended the statute to apply terrorist m