Ireland has declined the last 18 extradition requests from the United States, the US Department of Justice has said.
The US attorney's office in Spokane, Washington, said it was warned by the Justice Department in Washington that Irish authorities had declined 18 extradition proceedings in a row.
A fugitive from Washington state, Frederick David Russell (27), was arrested in Dublin on Sunday after living in Ireland for nine months.
Mr Russell, who is sought in relation to a car accident in June 2001 that left three students dead and two seriously injured, is the first person placed to date on the US Marshals' 15 most-wanted list for a drink-driving case.
He had been living in Celbridge, Co Kildare, with his girlfriend and was working as a security guard at a Dublin store, according to US authorities.
His arrest came just days after The Irish Times made a formal request to the US Department of Justice's extradition section for information on the status of his case.
The US marshal for the eastern district of Washington, Michael Kline, said his office had been waiting for many months for Irish authorities to arrest Mr Russell on foot of an extradition request.
Scott Malkowski, a deputy US marshal working at the office, praised the professionalism of gardaí but said it was "a hell of a journey" to move the extradition process forward.
Carol Laverne, chief deputy prosecutor of Whitman County in Washington, where the Russell case originated, said the Justice Department told her in early September that the Irish authorities would decline the extradition because the statute under which Mr Russell was charged did not equate with Irish law.
However, she said that Irish authorities later changed their minds.
Ms Laverne said she had sent an extradition package of between 100 and 150 pages in June, based on detailed information sought by the Irish authorities, including a statement from the person who first took Mr Russell's fingerprints after he was arrested.
On August 30th, a US Justice Department lawyer met Irish Department of Justice officials in Dublin in an attempt to accelerate the extradition of Mr Russell and a Californian paedophile, Dr James Daly (64), from Salinas, California, who later fled Ireland.
He was arrested in Uruguay earlier this month.
At that meeting, Irish solicitors requested supplemental information on the Daly case, including whether the Californian court clerks had the right to notarise documents.