The High Court has refused to order the release of Fatai Ganyiu, ruling that his detention at Dublin Airport was not unlawful despite a delay of several hours in taking him to Cloverhill Prison.
Mr Justice Hogan delivered the judgment on 12 November 2013 in an inquiry under Article 40.4 of the Constitution. The case concerned two periods: restraint while Mr Ganyiu was processed after arriving in Ireland, and his detention at Terminal 2 after he was refused leave to land.
Mr Ganyiu, a Nigerian national already subject to a deportation order, had been returned from the United Kingdom under the Dublin Regulation. He arrived at Dublin Airport on the morning of 5 November. Garda evidence was that he was taken from Terminal 1 to an immigration office in Terminal 2, where he was formally refused leave to land at about 9.30am.
His counsel argued that there was no legal basis for restraining him before that refusal, and that his continued detention at the airport until he was taken to Cloverhill was unlawful. The judge rejected the first argument, holding that the transfer between terminals and the restraint needed for immigration processing formed part of an examination permitted by section 4(5) of the Immigration Act 2004.
The court accepted that Dublin Airport had not been designated as a place of detention under the Immigration Act 2003. But it distinguished the case from an earlier ruling in which a person had been kept at Terminal 2 while arrangements were made for removal. Here, the judge said, Gardaí had intended to take Mr Ganyiu to Cloverhill soon after refusing him leave to land. The delay followed a sequence of events affecting the available escort unit, including its need to collect another person due to be deported and an unexpected diversion to deal with an alleged shoplifting incident. The van used to transfer Mr Ganyiu between terminals was not roadworthy for the journey to the prison.
The judge characterised the delay as arising from unforeseen events outside the Garda immigration unit’s direct and immediate control, rather than an intention to use the airport as a detention facility. He also rejected an argument that a reference to the “Minister for Justice” instead of the “Minister for Justice and Equality” in the detention notice invalidated it, treating the discrepancy as harmless.
The court rejected the claim that the detention was unlawful and refused to order Mr Ganyiu’s release under Article 40.4.2. The judgment addressed the lawfulness of detention; it did not determine the deportation order itself.