The High Court has ordered the extradition respondent identified as M.C.T.W. committed to prison pending an order by the Minister for Justice on her extradition to the United States, where she is sought for prosecution on one count of international parental kidnapping.
In a judgment delivered on 12 January 2021, Mr Justice Paul Burns said the statutory requirements for making the order had been met. The order under section 29(1) of the Extradition Act 1965 commits the respondent to prison to await the Minister’s order. It is not itself a final ministerial decision on extradition.
The US indictment alleges that, from about 7 August 2018 until its return on 4 December 2018, the respondent retained two children outside the United States intending to obstruct another person’s parental rights. The judgment recounts that a Mississippi court had allowed her to take the children to Denmark for a defined period and ordered their return by 6 August 2018. The respondent did not return them then. The judgment also records that a Danish court ordered their return and that they were later returned to the United States under an agreement reached during Hague Convention proceedings in Ireland.
The respondent argued that the alleged conduct did not correspond to an Irish offence, that surrender would threaten her rights and family life, and that the United States request should fail for other reasons, including delay. The court rejected those objections. It found that the continuing allegation of keeping the children abroad could correspond to the Irish offence of parental child abduction under section 16 of the Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act 1997. It distinguished an earlier High Court decision involving an indictment framed around retention on a single day.
On detention conditions and legal representation, the judge relied on an affidavit from a retired Mississippi lawyer, who said the respondent would have a defence attorney and a fair trial, and described prison conditions as unpleasant but not dangerous. The court dismissed the objections based on alleged risk of inhuman treatment and denial of legal representation. It also found the evidence did not establish an exceptional interference with private or family life that justified preventing surrender.
The judge rejected objections concerning Denmark’s decision not to prosecute, public interest, delay and alleged defects in the US documentation. He concluded there was no bar to the order and that no injustice would result from making it despite any documentary defects.