Instructions to Deputy US Marshals

Article

From the Fort Smith Elevator, February 11, 1887.

DEPUTY MARSHALS

United States Marshal, John Carrol [sic], has issued the following letter of instructions

TO DEPUTY MARSHALS:

In order to inform you of the propriety or impropriety of many things which you are called upon to decide for yourselves, without opportunity of consultation, and to point out in a general way your line of duty, I have thought proper to address you this circular-letter, and ask your careful attention to it:

Deputies are not allowed to carry arms only when engaged in good faith in the attempt to serve process. When off duty, the carrying of weapons is forbidden by law.

No deputy is allowed to make arrests outside the limits of his district, no matter whether the crime charged against the prisoner was commited [sic] in or out of his district.

No deputy is permitted to go into the Indian country and bring out to the State jurisdiction any property, except such as he may have legal process for. Deputies can not act as agents of individuals to collect debts or recover property; where to do so involves trespasses upon the property of residents of the Indian country.

Deputies are not allowed to file informations in cases of bigamy or in proceedings to put an offender under a peace bond. In ordinary cases deputies must see the witnesses by whom they expect to sustain the charge before they will be allowed a writ. This should be strictly observed: First, as a protection to the citizen from unnecessary arrest; second, as a protection to the Government against useless expense, and third, as a protection to the deputy, whose accounts are disallowed if the evidence shows a prosecution to have been frivolous.

Deputies should procure warrants in all cases before attempting to make arrests; but may arrest offenders where the crime is committed in their presence, or where being satisfied, in good faith, that a crime has been committed, they have good reason to believe that the criminal will escape before a writ can be procured.

Deputies can not send their guards or posse to perform independent services in the name of the deputy. The duty of a guard is to see that prisoners do not break custody and to perform such other service as he and the other deputy agree upon. The duty of a posse is to assist the deputy in the performance of duties where the nature of the service makes it unsafe for the deputy to act alone.

No accounts for services performed by posse will be allowed any deputy, unless such service was performed in his presence and by his direction. The account of a posse must include only charges for the time between the date of his employment and the date of the last arrest by the deputy, with additional time as the posse may require for going from the place of such last arrest to his place of residence. This posse account of $3.00 per day is the property of the posse and not an allowance to the deputy.

The following is the statue [sic] with reference to false accounts: “Every person who makes or causes to be made, or presents or causes to be presented, for payment or approval, to or by any person or officer in the civil, military or naval service of the United States, any claim upon or against the Government of the United States, or any department or officer thereof, knowing such claim to be false, fictitious, or fraudulent, or who, for the purpose of obtaining or aiding to obtain the payment or approval of such claim, makes, uses or causes to be made or used, any false bill, receipt, voucher, roll, account, claim, certificate, affidavit, or deposition, knowing the same to contain any fraudulent or fictitious statement or entry, or who enters into any agreement, combination, or conspiracy to defraud the Government of the United State, or any department or officer thereof, by obtaining or aiding to obtain the payment or allowance of any false or fraudulent claim, every person so offending in any of the matters set forth in this section shall be imprisoned at hard labor for not less than one nor more than five years, or fined not less than one thousand nor more than five thousand dollars.

The subsistence of prisoners, after arrest, is a matter to which especial attention is called. Deputies are allowed only the actual cost of food consumed by prisoners, and this should not exceed the sum of seventy-five cents each per day. The food of the deputy, posse and guards must not be included in this charge at all. The deputy can make such arrangement as he chooses for the feeding of himself and guards; and the posse receives $3.00 per day in full of his claim for services rendered.

The law provides that the doing of certain acts shall constitute a crime and subject the offender to punishment. In this view of the subject all violators of law should be punished; but deputies are urged to discriminate, as far as possible, between those offenses which are willful, substantial crimes and those which are of mere technical or trifling character. The prosecution of offenders of this latter character involves expense as great as though the crimes were heinous and brings the law and court into disrepute.

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