4 ms·
Early naturalization for spouses in Germany can happen after 3 years of legal residence, but they only moved mid-2020 according to wikipedia, so she shouldn't b
by rndgermandude 5y ago
Early naturalization for spouses in Germany can happen after 3 years of legal residence, but they only moved mid-2020 according to wikipedia, so she shouldn't be a citizen just yet.
However, extraditing just her (cannot extradite him, he is a citizen) will be probably hard due to technicalities and bureaucracy. The health condition may be a factor in a German court decision. Furthermore the alleged crimes and penalties are a major hurdle... According to the twitter thread, she'd face up to 95 years imprisonment, which creates two legal problems for any extradition: It is a vastly longer sentence than what she'd face in Germany for equivalent crimes - so a German court might require assurances first that in the US she wouldn't face a maximum sentence so vastly different than one she'd face in Germany [0] - and 95 years could be considered by a German court as an effective death sentence and Germany does not allow death sentences - this was the case when Turkey wanted some PKK people extradited on terrorism charges, and had agreed to max life imprisonment without parole instead of a death penalty, but the highest German court then ruled against extradition, saying life imprisonment without parole / likely death in prison is equivalent to a death sentence, as it removes any hope for the prisoner to one day become a free person again, and considered that cruel and inhumane[1].
I'd think she might not have been extradited yet because behind the scenes the US and Germany might be still haggling about what charges with what maximum sentences she might be charged under, before the German state prosecutor office files for extradition on behalf of the US. If she manages to become naturalized before that, that may mean game over for any extradition.
Germany could refuse naturalization based on her alleged criminal behavior, but that's unlikely, as she wasn't convicted and as the alleged crimes are non-violent; Germany will usually only refuse naturalization of spouses when there have been previous convictions or solid allegations of extremist and/or grossly violent crimes.
[0] E.g. Puigdemont, one of the leaders of the Catalonian separatist movement, was requested to be extradited from Germany to Spain on the charge of "rebellion". German courts found that there is no equivalent crime in the German penal code, and refused to extradite on this charge. Spain would have had to drop the rebellion charge, and have him extradited on the lesser misuse of public funds charge, which they weren't willing to do, so the extradition proceedings were aborted.
[1] https://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/Entscheidungen/EN/2010/01/rk20100116_2bvr229909en.html https://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/Entscheid...