Do federal courts have general jurisdiction over murder and other crimes that occur within National Forests? Not being much of a crimlaw guy, I would have assumed the answer was "yes." In United States v. Gabrion, a divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit confirms my intuition, holding that a murder on federal property in a national forest did occur within federal territorial jurisdiction, but also shows this is a more complicated question than I would have assumed. The three judge panel produced three opinions. Judge Batchelder delivered the opinion of the court, Judge Moore concurred in the judgment, and Judge Merritt dissented.

UPDATE: How Appealing has more here.