The High Court has ordered the surrender of Tomas Tamulaitis to Lithuania after dismissing his remaining objection to a European arrest warrant.
In a judgment delivered on 24 July 2020, Mr Justice Paul Burns ruled that the warrant’s wording and the points raised by the respondent did not overcome the statutory presumption that a decision had been made in Lithuania to charge and try him. The court said the warrant expressly sought his arrest and surrender for a criminal prosecution.
The Minister for Justice and Equality applied for surrender under a warrant issued by Lithuania’s Prosecutor General’s Office on 21 March 2019. The High Court endorsed the warrant on 13 January 2020. Tamulaitis was arrested and brought before the court on 3 February 2020, when he was admitted to bail.
His written objections had also raised delay and whether the alleged offence corresponded to an Irish offence. At the hearing, however, his counsel pursued only the question of whether Lithuania had decided to charge and try him. Counsel accepted that he could not prove no such decision had been made, but argued that parts of the warrant raised enough uncertainty to require the court to investigate.
Those passages described the domestic measure as an arrest during a pre-trial investigation, said Tamulaitis was “suspected” of misappropriating entrusted property, and stated that he had absconded from the investigation and was declared wanted. The judge found these points were not sufficiently cogent to rebut the presumption or require an inquiry. He said the issuing state did not have to demonstrate a formal decision; surrender could be refused only if the court was satisfied that no decision to charge and try had been made.
For completeness, the judge said the alleged offence corresponded to making a gain or causing loss by deception under section 6 of Ireland’s Criminal Justice (Theft and Fraud Offences) Act 2001. He also found the lapse of time did not justify refusing surrender, referring to the Supreme Court’s guidance that delay must be truly exceptional or egregious. Those matters were not pursued at the hearing.
The court found surrender was not prohibited under sections 21A, 22, 23 or 24 of the 2003 Act or Part Three. It dismissed the objections and ordered surrender to Lithuania under section 16(1). The judgment records no decision by the Lithuanian court on the underlying allegation.