The High Court has ordered the surrender of a man to Poland under a European arrest warrant, so he can serve the outstanding balance of a prison sentence imposed there.
In a judgment delivered on 28 January 2009, Mr Justice Michael Peart rejected the respondent’s objections and said the court was required to make the surrender order. The judgment records that the sentence was four years and six months, with one year and 173 days remaining. It does not state that the surrender had already taken place.
The warrant was issued in Poland on 4 June 2007 and endorsed for execution in Ireland by the High Court on 30 April 2008. The respondent was arrested on 6 May 2008. The judge said there was no dispute about his identity and that affidavit evidence satisfied him that the person before the court was the person named in the warrant.
One of the two offences was marked in the warrant as racketeering and extortion, a category for which the judge said double criminality did not have to be verified. The other concerned an allegation that the respondent and another person acted together in Gliwice on 19 January 2003, assaulted a man and took his Nokia mobile phone, valued at 400 Polish zloty. The judge found that the described conduct corresponded to robbery under Irish law and also disclosed assault.
The respondent said he had not fled Poland. He stated that he had received permission to leave prison for specialist medical treatment after an injury, did not know when he was required to return, and believed he had served his sentence. The issuing authority said his temporary release was granted only until 27 June 2006, that he was told of the decision, and that he was subject to conditions including contact with a court-appointed curator. The judge rejected the respondent’s account, found he had breached the release conditions and concluded that he came within section 10 of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003.
The respondent also argued that surrender was barred because a single sentence covered two offences and it was unclear whether at least four months had been imposed for each. The judge held that the statutory threshold was met because both offences corresponded to offences under Irish law and the single sentence exceeded four months. He distinguished a Supreme Court case involving a composite sentence where one offence did not correspond.
The respondent had attended his trial and conviction, so the judge said no retrial undertaking was required. He concluded that the objections failed and ordered surrender to Poland.