Dоrman Dwayne Walker appeals from his conviction in the district court, entered after a jury trial, for escape from custody, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 751(а). The sole question presented on appeal is whether the government’s failure to inform Walker in a notice of federal detainer form оf his right to request a speedy trial warrants a dismissal of the underlying charge. The district court 2 answered that question in the negative, and we affirm.
I. BACKGROUND
In March 1998, Walker walked away from a Minneapolis halfway house where he was completing a federal sentence for escape. In June 1998, Walker was arrested by the U.S. Customs Service while attempting to enter California from Mexico with some 40 pounds of marijuana. Walker pleaded guilty to drug charges in California state court and was sentenced tо three years imprisonment. Meanwhile, Walker was indicted on federal escape charges. On June 10, 1998, after his arrest in California, the government sеrved Walker with the detainer notice relating to his Minneapolis escape. The detainer notice contained language generally instruсting the official who has custody of the inmate that the notice requirements of the Speedy Trial Act (STA) may apply. In particular, the notice inсluded the following instruction:
If there is an “X” mark in the following space, the notice requirements of the [STA] apply and you are requested to give a сopy of the Detainer to the prisoner and to complete the attached Form USM-17, NOTIFICATION REQUIREMENTS-SPEEDY TRIAL ACT, in duplicate, and return both copies of the Form USM-17 3 tо this office with receipted copies 2 and 8 of this Detainer.
(Appellee’s Br. at A-7.) Because Walker was not yet serving the California sentence, the box following this sentence was properly left unchecked.
On July 15, 1998, after Walker was sentenced on the California charges, the government served him with a superseding federal detainer informing him of the pending escape charge in Minnesota. Because Walker had, at that point, begun to serve his California sentence, the box intended to trigger notice to Walker of his speedy trial rights should have been checked, but was not.
In May 1999, Walker filed a pro se motion to dismiss the detainer in federal court in California. The motion was treated as a 28 U.S.C. § 2241 habeas petition and denied on the ground that the proper forum for Walker’s petition was the underlying Minnesota criminal prosecution.
Walker was transported to Minnesota in July 1999, аnd filed a motion to dismiss the indictment with prejudice based on a violation of the STA and the Interstate Agreement on Detainers (IAD). The magistrate recommended that Walker’s motion be de *542 nied, as neither the STA nor the IAD authorized dismissal of an indictment as a sanction for the violation. The district court adopted the magistrate’s recommendation and denied Walker’s motion for dismissal. Walker was convicted after a jury trial and sentenced to 38 months imprisonment. Walker appeals, raising only the STA/IAD issue.
II. DISCUSSION
Under the STA, if a federal prosecutor knows that a person charged with a crime is currently incarcerated, that prosecutor must either (1) obtain the prisoner’s presence for trial or (2) file a detainer with the person who has custody of the prisoner and request that the prisoner receive notice of the detainer and his right to demand a trial. 18 U.S.C. § 3161(j)(l). The STA also requires that the person who has custody of the prisoner
promptly advise the prisoner of the charge and of the prisoner’s right to demand trial. If at any time thereafter the prisoner informs the person having custody that he does demand trial, such person shall cause notice to that effect to be sent prоmptly to the attorney for the Government who caused the detain-er to be filed.
18 U.S.C. § 3161(j)(2).
The IAD also requires that notice of speedy trial rights be given to prisoners subject to a detainer from another jurisdiction:
The warden, commissioner of corrections, or other official having custody of the prisoner shall promptly inform him of the source and contents of any detain-er lodged against him and shall also inform him of his right to make a request for final disрosition of the indictment, information, or complaint on which the detainer is based.
18 U.S.C.App. § 2, Art. III(c).
Although it is an issue of first impression in this circuit, other courts have concluded that dismissal of an indictment is not an appropriate remedy for violations of § 3161(j)(1).
See United States v. Guzman,
Similarly, dismissal is specified as a remedy for certain IAD violations, but the speedy-trial noticе provision is not among them, and two circuits have declined to expand the list of situations in which dismissal is warranted.
See United States v. Pena-Corea,
In
Reed,
a prisoner received imperfect notice of a federal escape detainer аnd his right to request a speedy trial of that
*543
charge. The prisoner then made an imperfect request for a speedy trial, which the government failеd to honor. The district court denied the inmate’s motion to dismiss the indictment for failure to comply with the IAD, but the Ninth Circuit reversed. The court concluded that dismissal is an appropriate remedy “when the government has failed to fulfill its obligations under the [IAD], yet the prisoner has clearly attempted to get a speedy trial.”
We disagree that Reed and Zfaty support dismissal as a remedy in Walker’s case. We read them to stand for the proposition that where the government has failed to comply with IAD notice requirements, it is bound to comply with an inmate’s IAD request for speedy trial even if that request fails to comply with the IAD’s technical requirements. As such, the imposition of dismissal as a remedy falls squarely within IAD Article V(c), which expressly authorizes dismissal for failure to timely honor а prisoner’s request for final disposition.
We also reject Walker’s remaining arguments for reversal. We are unconvinced that despite the IAD’s silenсe on the matter, the more stringent procedural requirements imposed by the IAD compel a judicially-created dismissal remedy for the government’s omission in this instance. Moreover, we find it difficult to accept Walker’s assertions of prejudice as a result of the government’s failure, as the record indicates that after the district court rejected his motion to dismiss the escape charge, he sought a continuance of the trial date on three occasions.
We conclude the district court did not err in refusing to dismiss the indictment against Walker, and we leave for another day the question of whether and under what circumstances such a remedy may be justified.