In the end, it could be something that would seem rather insignificant that might mean the difference between life and death for Dru Sjodin's killer.
Instead of driving west into the vast open prairies of North Dakota, the kidnapper happened to go east, across the Red River, the Minnesota state boundary, and a legal chasm that could make the case federal and death-penalty eligible.
And it happened at a time when political winds are blowing in favor of seeking capital punishment in federal cases, even in states that don't have it.
"Oh, the vagaries of the law," said former U.S. Attorney for Minnesota B. Todd Jones, who said he anticipates the case likely will bring a federal charge of kidnapping resulting in death.
Sjodin's body was found Saturday near Crookston, Minn., nearly five months after the 22-year-old disappeared outside a Grand Forks, N.D., shopping mall. Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., a convicted sex offender from Crookston, has been charged with her kidnapping.
Because her body was discovered in Minnesota, it opened the door for prosecutors to upgrade charges against Rodriguez from kidnapping to murder and for the federal government to seek the death penalty even though neither Minnesota nor North Dakota law allows for capital punishment.
Crossing the line
If her body had been found in North Dakota, experts say, it might have remained a state case.
"If they hadn't have crossed the state line, I don't believe there would be any federal jurisdiction in the case, from the facts that I know," Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom said.
Thomas Heffelfinger, U.S. attorney for Minnesota, wouldn't comment Sunday about the possibility of federal charges but said federal authorities have watched the case from the beginning, "recognizing this kidnapping took place a stone's throw from the Minnesota border."
Both Heffelfinger and Drew Wrigley, U.S. attorney for North Dakota, appeared at a news conference Saturday, and some in the legal community said their presence spoke volumes.
"That's unusual and tells us a lot," said former U.S. attorney for Minnesota David Lillehaug. "They didn't say much, but they didn't need to."
If Sjodin's case goes federal, Attorney General John Ashcroft would have the final say on whether to seek the death penalty after a Justice Department committee reviews recommendations by a local U.S. attorney.
"This is a poster child case for the death penalty," said Minneapolis defense attorney Joe Friedberg, citing the egregiousness of the case and Ashcroft's record of seeking the death penalty in other cases.
Murder alone is a state crime. But when it is committed in addition to federal crimes such as kidnapping across state lines or carjacking, it can become a federal offense.
Former federal prosecutors said that under the charge that would probably be used, it doesn't matter where Sjodin died -- in North Dakota or Minnesota -- as long as her body crossed a state line.
In rare cases, someone can be tried in both state and federal courts for the same crime.
Jones said that when he was U.S. attorney from 1998 to 2001, there seemed to be a "higher level of sensitivity to state law with respect to death penalty issues."
The Justice Department now is aiming for more uniform sentencing across the country "not making exceptions driven by state statutes or local conditions," Jones said.
Under federal guidelines, whether a state has the death penalty isn't supposed to weigh on federal prosecutors' decisions, Lillehaug said.
In practice, he said, it can come into play, though.
In recent years, death penalty sentences have been handed out in other states that don't have death penalties.
Ashcroft approved pursuit of the death penalty in 20 of the 45 eligible cases he has considered through March 1, 2003, according to the federal defense bar. He also had reversed the recommendations of federal prosecutors 28 times, ordering them to seek the death penalty in cases where they had recommended against doing so, according to the Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel Project.
In one Vermont case, Ashcroft told prosecutors to withdraw a plea agreement they had made with a man on trial for carjacking and kidnapping that led to a woman's death in 2002. Ashcroft ordered them to seek the death penalty in the case.
"It's fair to say that he's been more aggressive in favor of the death penalty than any of his predecessors," Lillehaug said. "Having said that, [Sjodin's case] would be a very strong candidate for the death penalty under any attorney general. Because of the criminal background of the alleged perpetrator, the fact that it was a stranger abduction and, let's face it, the political climate and the national publicity. This is one [case] where probably John Ashcroft already knows the name of Dru Sjodin."
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