EXTRADITION STIRS UP CONTROVERSY.

Byline: Lisa Friedman Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON - The family of slain Los Angeles sheriff's Deputy David March finds both solace and sadness in the arrest in Mexico of a man suspected of killing a Denver police officer.

But the decision of the Denver district attorney to not seek the death penalty or life imprisonment in exchange for getting the suspected killer back to the U.S. also has exacerbated rifts within the March family and added to recriminations about the case.

In Washington, both the Los Angeles and Denver cases are serving as a call to arms among members of Congress bent on pressuring the administration to renegotiate its extradition treaty with Mexico.

Under that pact, the Mexican government refuses to extradite criminal suspects who may face the death penalty or life in prison, both of which the Mexican Supreme Court has ruled to be cruel and unusual punishment.

``We have to go back and renegotiate the treaty. And we will not make substantial headway until the secretary of state and the president make this a priority,'' said Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley.

Cooley, unlike the Denver district attorney, said he will not consider forgoing death penalty or life imprisonment charges against Armando Garcia, the man police suspect in March's killing at a traffic stop in Irwindale in 2002. Garcia has since fled to Mexico.

``It's a matter of principle,'' Cooley said. ``It's also a matter of not creating incentives for murderers. We here in Los Angeles County are not going to discount the price for killing'' just because a suspect manages to make it across the border.

``You can't be giving an advantage to a serious criminal. It creates a two-tiered justice system.''

March's father, John, a Santa Clarita resident, said he knows his son's case is at stake, but so are hundreds of others. Prosecutors estimate nearly 400 people have committed murder or other major offenses in California and fled to Mexico to escape prosecution.

``If we sell out, what chance do they have? We want David's life to have counted. We want a change in the law,'' he said.

But David March's widow, Terri, said she wants to see her husband's killer behind bars.

Terri March said she doesn't mind her late husband serving as a symbol for what many feel is a faulty treaty agreement with Mexico. But she also doesn't want the flesh-and-blood man who lost his life while protecting the public to be forgotten.

David March's killer, she said, ``needs to be taken out of society in his prime years. If he doesn't get a life sentence or the death penalty, that's OK. If he gets paroled when he's 60 or 70, I think he's less dangerous to society and that's how I live with my decision.

``I don't want more lives spared while he's living out there among innocent people.''

Of the family of slain Denver Detective Donald Young, she said, ``I'm relieved for them, but obviously sad for us. Our efforts and our ability to do anything, I'm scared, have diminished with time.''

Young and Detective John Bishop were shot on May 8 while working security at a baptismal party in Denver. Young was killed and Bishop was wounded.

Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey decided to accede to Mexico's restrictions in requesting the extradition largely because both Young's family and Bishop wanted the gunman prosecuted locally, spokeswoman Lynn Kimbrough said.

``There was an awareness that there were going to be limitations on what we were going to be able to do. But OK,'' Kimbrough said, likening it to cases in which the suspect is a juvenile or suffers mental illness and death penalty charges are similarly unavailable. Both Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca and Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Pasadena, a former U.S. attorney who has been urging changes to the extradition treaty, praised the Denver decision.

Schiff said he believes Mexico's resistance to life imprisonment charges is largely rhetorical.

``If we can get (March's killer) back and lock him up for 70 years or 60 years, that's the rest of his life,'' he said.

Without criticizing Cooley's handling of the March case, Baca said, ``Each D.A. has its own belief system, which doesn't make one right or the other wrong.

``I'm very impressed with the decision by the Denver district attorney. He understands that justice delayed is justice denied.''

Mexico is not alone in refusing to extradite to nations with capital punishment unless it is assured the death penalty will not be imposed. Canada and most European nations also have similar restrictions in their extradition treaties.

Yet with fleeing criminal suspects heading to Mexico more often than anywhere else, that's where the political heat has been. On Thursday the House International Relations Committee unanimously accepted an amendment by Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., urging the Mexican Supreme Court to ``revisit'' its ruling.

The measure also requires the State Department to file annual reports detailing annual extradition requests by the U.S. and Mexico.

Baca said he too is outraged at the notion of Mexico imposing its will on U.S. prosecutors seeking justice for crimes committed against citizens, particularly cops, on American soil.

But, he said, while he advocates changing the treaty, ``if you work to get that done first instead of swifter justice for Deputy David March, you may not get either.''

Cooley maintained that real justice for March will come in changing the laws.

``The solution is simple,'' he said. ``We need a better, improved extradition treaty with Mexico.''

Lisa Friedman, [phone]

lisa.friedman(at)langnews.com

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