• Man was charged with engaging in electronic communication relating or describing sexual conduct with a child.

The state does not intend to extradite a man who traveled from Ohio to Glenwood to find a student he had met online.

This is according to a letter signed by Troy Nelson, assistant Pope County Attorney, that was filed on Aug. 16 and reported last week. 

Christian James Mackson, 30, was charged in April of 2022 with engaging in electronic communication relating or describing sexual conduct with a child.

The letter reads, “The State does not intend to extradite defendant Mackson from his current location and has made such known to the holding facility at the time of his arrest. Alternatively, the State would request that the Court convert Mr. Mackson’s current nationwide warrant to a Minnesota and border states warrant.”

The decision not to extradite was made in consultation with the victim’s family and in consideration of the public interest, Nelson stated. The case does, however, remain pending and a warrant has been issued for the defendant’s arrest in Minnesota and border states. Mackson was due to be sentenced on May 25, but he did not attend the hearing.

On Aug. 9, a petition was filed to reinstate and discharge Mackson’s bond, which was in the amount of $50,000 and which Mackson forfeited.

In addition, on May 30, a “letter rogatory” for relief and affidavit of service was filed. According to information published by Cornell Law School, the term rogatory denotes a formal request from a court in which an action is pending, to a foreign court to perform some judicial act.

In Mackson’s case, the request is for his name to be cleared unless his own requests are met.

These requests all stem from Mackson’s claim that the Pope County Court “is not really a court as per the Constitution of the United States, but rather a tribunal operated as a private corporation.”

Near the end of the document it reads, “I expect no further harassment from rogue unregistered foreign agents.”

The entire document is seven pages long, but nowhere does it address the crime Mackson is alleged to have committed.

On April 29 last year, the Pope County Sheriff’s Office received a report from Minnewaska Area Middle School of an unknown man at the school, according to news release from Pope County Sheriff’s Office at that time.  

Thanks to the quick actions of school staff, the Pope County Sheriff’s Office and Glenwood Police Department were able to apprehend Mackson at a Pope County hotel, the news release read.  A law enforcement investigation revealed then 29-year-old Christian James Mackson of Dayton, Ohio had traveled to Glenwood on April 29 for the sole purpose of finding a student he had met online. Mackson appeared in Pope County District Court Monday, May 2, 2022 to face a felony charge of Electronic Communication Relating or Describing Sexual Conduct with a Child, it was stated by the Pope County Sheriff’s Office.

Mackson had filed a petition to plead guilty with a stay of adjudication via an Alford plea back in February of this year.