Extradition in Costa Rica: the necessary enhanced due diligence to avoid arbitrary impunity

Abstract

This article examines, with critical, reflective, and proactive thinking, various issues of the Costa Rican Extradition Law, and the recent reform to the Article 32 of the Political Constitution on this matter, which prohibits the extradition of nationals, and now authorizes it for drug trafficking and terrorism offenses. The Costa Rican criminal policy criteria that have revolved and continue to revolve around its regulatory framework are evaluated, as well as the potential for the so-called “political crime” as an exclusion clause from extradition. While the romanticized concept of crime inspired by supposedly altruistic political motives continues to exist in the legal system, and despite the fact that it must disappear, a restrictive, logical-systematic, and teleological interpretation is proposed, with an adequate control of conventionality, to ensure the state's duty (in terms of means, not results) to investigate, prosecute, and, if appropriate, punish crimes; and, in this way, avoid not only arbitrary impunity bur also a fraud of law. Furthermore, it is explained that the prohibition on extraditing nationals does not equate to impunity.