Larimer

These appeals involve like questions, namely: Whether the state is chargeable with the expense incurred by an agent thereof who, acting under a requisition issued by the Governor, was authorized to receive in custody a fugitive from justice found in a sister state and return him to this state for trial.

It appears in each case that after his arrest the fugitive sued out a writ of habeas corpus in the court of the state where he was apprehended and by such court was released on bail. Pending the hearing of the writ he made his escape, by reason of which fact the state’s agent was unable to return him to this state for trial.

In each of the cases the appeal is from an order granting a peremptory writ of mandate commanding the board of control to audit and allow the claim against the state for the expenditures made by petitioner’s assignor in performance of the duties imposed upon him as such agent under the requisition issued by the chief executive.

The solution of the question depends solely upon the interpretation of section 1557 of the Penal Code, the meaning of which, to our minds, is not open to controversy. As it stood prior to 1913, it read as follows: “When the governor…