The High Court has refused a Bangladeshi man’s application to overturn a review decision that upheld a finding that his marriage to a Romanian citizen was one of convenience.
In a judgment delivered on 21 December 2022, Ms Justice Miriam O’Regan held that the Minister for Justice’s process was not unlawful and that a further oral hearing was not required. The case was a judicial review of the Minister’s review decision of 11 April 2022. It was not a fresh determination of the marriage or an appeal against the earlier revocation of the man’s residence permission.
The applicant argued that the finding depended on an adverse assessment of his credibility and that fairness required an oral hearing. He relied on an earlier High Court decision, ZK v Minister for Justice, and said the Minister had focused on circumstantial matters without a sufficiently rigorous investigation. The Minister opposed the application, arguing that the applicant had been interviewed and officials had spoken by phone with his former spouse.
The dispute arose after the applicant was questioned at Dublin Airport on 18 February 2019. The judgment recounts that immigration officials spoke twice by phone with his former spouse during the encounter. Their accounts differed on matters including whether they remained in contact and who attended their wedding. The former spouse later sent officials a copy of a divorce certificate dated 6 July 2017.
The Minister’s office wrote to the applicant in December 2019 setting out concerns about the relationship and inviting representations and supporting material. His solicitor responded, saying he accepted the marriage had ended and did not challenge revocation of his residence card, but disputed that the marriage had been one of convenience. The Minister made that finding in January 2020. On review in April 2022, the Minister upheld the marriage finding but set aside a separate finding that the residence application contained false and misleading information about a material fact.
Justice O’Regan distinguished the case from ZK. She noted that the applicant had been given notice of the Minister’s concerns but had provided no documents addressing them, and that his response was minimal. The court also noted that he had not identified anything he could have raised orally that could not have been included in written submissions. The judge considered that the airport interview and the two phone conversations meant there had been oral engagement in the process.
The court refused the relief sought. On costs, the judge gave a provisional view that the Minister should receive costs, to be adjudicated if the parties could not agree. The parties were allowed 14 days to make written submissions on that proposal; the judgment does not state a final costs order.