The Ninth Circuit ruled in, United States v. Juarez, that the Federal that the tolling of a term of supervised release begins whenever a person absconds not when a warrant is issued.

Manuel Ignacio Juarez was sentenced to 46 months in prison and four years of supervised release in 1989 for bank robbery. After he did his 46 months he was turned over to INS and deported. At some point prior to 1993 when he applied for a California driver’s license under a false name he came back into the country illegally. Since he did not notify his probation officer of his new address within 72 hours he was considered to be a fugitive.

He was arrested and released in 1994 for possession of paraphernalia and he was arrested and kept in custody in 1995 for two robberies. He was sentenced to 15 years. Time in custody is tolled towards completion of the supervised release.

A Federal Judge issued a bench warrant for him for violation of his supervised release in 2005. When he was released from prison on the state robbery charges in 2009, he was turned over to the Feds on the supervised release warrant and he was sentenced to eighteen months. He appealed claiming that his supervised released terminated prior to the the issuing of the warrant. When excluding the time that Juarez was a fugitive and the time that he was in state custody his period of supervised release did not terminate prior to the issuance of the warrant in 2005. Once a warrant is issued the period is tolled until Juarez is brought back into Federal custody and a judge acts upon the warrant. In this case it was 2009.

Thus a period of supervised release can be a lifetime sentence. I doubt anyone really expected Juarez to report to his probation officer when he returned illegally to the country. (Although once I had a client who was released upon entering a plea and ordered to return for sentencing. No one expected this to happen since he was going to be deported. But just in case I showed up at the courthouse on the sentencing date. He had been deported and the judge issued a warrant. As I am walking out of the courthouse, who do I see? He knew he was supposed to be in court for sentencing so he illegally returned to the country for sentencing.) Thus Juarez was considered a fugitive. This could go on forever.