The High Court ordered Vasile Plecanciuc’s surrender to Romania under two European Arrest Warrants, but refused the application under a third because the warrant did not establish whether the sentence for one offence met a statutory minimum.
In a judgment delivered on 25 March 2015, Mr Justice McDermott considered three warrants seeking Plecanciuc’s surrender to serve three-year prison sentences imposed in Romania. The warrants concerned convictions following trials he did not attend.
For the first warrant, the court found that the description of “forgery in deeds by private signature”, read with the account of goods obtained using company documents, corresponded to offences under Irish law. The judge was also satisfied that information from Romanian authorities showed Plecanciuc had been notified of the trial, represented by a lawyer and had not sought a retrial or appeal within the applicable timeframe. The court found no bar to surrender under the second warrant either. It accepted that he had been informed of the proceedings and represented, including at the appeal stage. The judge noted an inconsistency in information about whether an appeal had been used, but said it did not invalidate that warrant.
The third warrant related to convictions for swindling and forgery. The court accepted that the warrant’s ticked “swindling” category was sufficient for the relevant offence description and was satisfied that the trial-in-absence information did not prevent surrender. However, the Romanian warrant said the two punishments had been “merged” into a three-year term without explaining how. The sentence imposed for forgery was not specified, and it was unclear whether at least four months’ imprisonment had been imposed for that offence, as required by section 38(1)(a)(ii) of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003.
The judge said surrender under the third warrant could not be ordered if the sentence for forgery was less than four months. Because the warrant did not provide enough certainty about the sentence calculation, the application under that warrant was refused. The court ordered surrender as sought under the first two warrants.