Reading Room Document

Constitutionality of 18 U.S.C. § 1120

Congress has clear constitutional authonty to proscribe killings committed by escaped federal inmates serving life sentences, as provided in 18 U.S.C. § 1120, where the killings facilitate the escape or the avoidance of recapture. Congress's penological and custodial interests in ensuring the incapacitation of life-sentenced federal inmates provide compelling support for the constitutionality of 18 U.S C. § 1120 even when it is applied with respect to a post-escape killing that is not related to the escape or subsequent efforts to avoid recapture. The OLC does not provide release dates for its opinions, so the release date listed is the date on which the opinion was authored. The original opinion is available at www.justice.gov/file/19381/download.

August 31, 2000