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Edmundo Lellis Filho is an attorney licensed to practice in Brazil and the European Union. He is a member of the International Bar Association (IBA) and the International Law Association (ILA – London). He is currently a Master of Laws (LL.M.) candidate in International Justice at the University of London. A retired judge of the São Paulo State Court of Justice (TJSP), he served on the bench from 1991 to 2022.
When a legal system prioritizes simplicity over integrity, it paves the way for ilegallity.
The Ker-Frisbie Doctrine vs. The Principle of Judicial Integrity
It has been observed that regarding the illegal apprehension of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela (January 3, 2026)—which mirrors the detention of Manuel Noriega in Panama (December 20, 1989)—United States jurisprudence has firmly established the principle that “it matters not how you get into court, provided you are within it.” This is known as the Ker-Frisbie doctrine, which asserts that the methods employed to arrest and bring a defendant to trial are irrelevant to the court’s jurisdiction over the individual.
Contrary to common assumptions, this is not a general principle of Common Law, but rather a specific tenet of the United States legal system. In the United Kingdom, the primary source of the Common Law tradition, the notion that the ends justify the means of detention is rejected. For British courts and jurists, the manner in which a person is detained and brought before the bench is of paramount importance.
In the United Kingdom, the case of R v Horseferry Road Magistrates’ Court, ex parte Bennett [1994] established a paradigm directly opposed to the American doctrine. The British House of Lords (then the highest appellate court) held that the means used to bring a person before the court are as significant as the trial itself.
Bennett, a New Zealander accused of fraud in the UK, was the victim of a collusion between British and South African police. They deceived him into believing he was being deported from South Africa to New Zealand on a flight with a layover in London. Upon landing at Heathrow, Bennett was arrested. The prosecution justified the detention using the maxim male captus, bene detentus (“wrongly captured, properly detained”). However, the House of Lords established three critical points in its ruling:
- The role of the judiciary is not merely to adjudicate guilt, but to protect the integrity of the justice system.
- The judiciary must possess the power to stay proceedings if the Executive branch acts unlawfully.
- Bringing a suspect before a court through illegal means constitutes an abuse of process.
As Lord Griffiths famously stated:
“The courts must refuse to allow the police to take advantage of their own lawless conduct… the judiciary must not condone behavior that threatens both fundamental human rights and the Rule of Law.”
Comparative Perspectives: Ker-Frisbie and the Brazilian Context
The Ker-Frisbie doctrine—named after Ker v. Illinois (1886) and Frisbie v. Collins (1952)—was reaffirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1992 in United States v. Alvarez-Machain.
In Brazilian law, the “Fruits of the Poisonous Tree” doctrine is distinct from these jurisdictional issues. It pertains specifically to the admissibility of evidence derived from illegal acts, a concept that also originated in American law via Nardone v. US (1939).
Philosophical Pragmatism and Modern Consequences
The American judiciary tends to view facts through the lens of Ockham’s Razor, suggesting that the simplest solution is often the most desirable: if an accused individual is present in court, the most practical course of action is to proceed with the trial.
This pragmatic approach to justice underlies recent tragic events, such as the incident in Minneapolis where an innocent American woman was shot by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents. Under this logic, if Maduro is indicted in a New York court, the “simplest” path—bypassing the complexities of international law—is military extraction. Similarly, if a citizen like Renee Nicole Good fails to comply with orders, the “simplest” path is the use of force, avoiding the complexity of a pursuit.
Utilizing counterfactual reasoning, one might argue that without an absolutist executive, federal agents would not feel empowered to act with such despotism. Ultimately, just as Maduro is a Venezuelan crisis, the current American administration is a domestic issue for the United States. The concern remains that, much like historical precedents where domestic leaders became global threats, the internal shifts in American legal and executive conduct may eventually become a problem for the world at large.
