The High Court ordered Henryk Walkowiak’s surrender to Poland under section 16 of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003, as amended, after rejecting his objections to surrender. Mr Justice Edwards delivered the judgment on 6 May 2011.
The warrant sought his return to serve an aggregate sentence of one year and eight months’ imprisonment for three offences. The judgment says the sentence had initially been suspended for three years, with probation supervision and an obligation to pay compensation. The suspension was later lifted after he deliberately failed to pay. He was present when the sentence was imposed and when the enforcement decision was announced.
Walkowiak argued that two of the three offences did not correspond to Irish offences and that, because the Polish court imposed a composite sentence, the court could not surrender him for any of the offences if either objection succeeded. The High Court found that the first offence corresponded to theft under Irish law, relying in part on additional information from the issuing authority that he had stolen money he was authorised to collect. The third offence corresponded to both forgery and using a false instrument. The second offence was a designated category offence, so correspondence did not have to be established for it. The court found that the minimum-gravity requirements were met for all three offences; it therefore did not need to decide whether the offences could be severed.
The remaining objection concerned the version of section 10 applicable before a 2009 amendment. It required the court to be satisfied that Walkowiak had “fled” Poland before serving the sentence. He argued there was insufficient evidence that he had fled rather than simply left the country.
The court considered information from the Polish authorities about the sentence, the appeal against its enforcement, and his departure. It found that he left for Ireland while the appeal was pending, without seeking the sentencing court’s permission or notifying it of his plans, and did not provide his new address. The judgment concluded that he had breached probation conditions, put himself beyond supervision and left to evade justice and avoid serving the sentence.
The court rejected all the specific objections and held that surrender was appropriate. The judgment records the order for surrender under section 16; it does not record that the transfer had already taken place.