476                                        VETOES

While we have in no way based our recommendations on this
factor, we urge that the General Assembly in any further considera-
tion of the Interstate Agreement on Detainers (which I sincerely
hope they will undertake and act upon favorably), pay further at-
tention to that portion of Article III (§616D of Senate Bill 5) which
states that after a prisoner requests trial "he shall be brought to trial
within one hundred eighty days after he shall have caused to be de-
livered to the prosecuting officer and the appropriate court of the
prosecuting officer's jurisdiction written notice of his place of im-
prisonment and his request for a final disposition to be made of the
indictment, information or complaint * * *". Since the Bill else-
where provides for delivery through the warden of the institution
where the prisoner is confined, we find some ambiguity in the em-
phasized words. If the warden in another state does not, through
inadvertence or otherwise, act upon a request by a prisoner to be
tried in Maryland, the prosecution in Maryland might be terminated
through no fault of and for reasons completely beyond the control
of any prosecuting official of this State. We cannot believe that the
General Assembly intended such a result, and we think that the
matter should be clarified.

We therefore recommend that you withhold approval of Senate
Bill 5, but further recommend that you urge passage of the Interstate
Agreement on Detainers in proper form as promptly as possible.

Very truly yours,

Thomas B. Finan,

Attorney General.

Senate Bill No. 6—Intrastate Detainers

AN ACT to add new Section 616A to Article 27 of the Annotated
Code of Maryland (1957 Edition and 1963 Supplement), title "Crimes
and Punishments," to be under the new subtitle "Detainers," and
new subheading "Intrastate Detainers," to follow immediately after
Section 616 thereof, to provide for the disposition of and to authorize
the processing of detainers based on untried indictments of the City
of Baltimore or any county of the State against persons incarcerated
in State correctional institutions or facilities, and relating generally
thereto.

April 7, 1964.

Honorable William S. James
President of the Senate
State House
Annapolis, Maryland

Dear Mr. President:

In accordance with Article II, Section 17 of the Maryland Con-
stitution, I am returning to you herewith Senate Bill No. 6 which
has been vetoed my me today.

The bill would add a new section to Article 27 of the Annotated
Code of Maryland, title "Crimes and Punishments," such section to