MacGregor went into hiding in the French provinces, while Lehuby fled to the southern Netherlands. Hippisley and Irving were informed on 6 September that they were being investigated for conspiracy to defraud and sell titles to land they did not own. Both insisted that they were innocent. They were taken that evening to La Force Prison. MacGregor was arrested after three months and brought to La Force on 7 December 1825. He speculated to his confederates that the charges against them must be the result of some abrupt change of policy by France, or of some Spanish intrigue calculated to undermine Poyaisian independence. The three men remained imprisoned without trial while the French attempted to extradite Lehuby from the Netherlands. Attempting to re-associate himself and Poyais with the republican movement in Latin America, MacGregor issued a French-language declaration from his prison cell on 10 January 1826, claiming that he was "contrary to human rights, held prisoner ... for reasons of which he is not aware" and "suffering as one of the founders of independence in the New World". This attempt to convince the French that he might have some kind of diplomatic immunity did not work. The French government and police ignored the announcement.