An interesting new article in The Hill by my occasional coauthor T. Markus Funk, based on his upcoming Oxford University Comparative Law Forum piece on the subject; an excerpt:
[I]t would be a mistake to accept the invitation to follow the examples of countries like Germany, Switzerland, Mexico, the Netherlands and Austria, which do not outlaw nonviolent prisoner escapes ….
German law exemplifies the logic used to justify this lenient approach. The "urge to be free" is said to be deeply ingrained in human nature, rendering the prisoner acting on the "instinct to escape" insufficiently morally blameworthy to justify additional charges. The number of prior escape attempts, like the inmate's criminal history, do not factor in….
