The High Court has ordered the surrender of Florin Hahui to Romania to serve a 14-year prison sentence imposed there for robbery in 1999. The order followed the court’s rejection of objections concerning notice of his trial in absentia and whether the alleged conduct corresponded to offences under Irish law.
The European Arrest Warrant, dated 26 January 2007, sought Hahui’s surrender to serve the sentence, which the judgment said remained entirely unserved. The warrant was endorsed for execution in Ireland on 19 December 2007. Hahui was arrested on 22 April 2008 and remanded pending the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform’s application under section 16 of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003.
Hahui argued that because he had been tried and sentenced in his absence, surrender required a written undertaking that he would be retried or given the opportunity for a retrial. The Minister submitted that no undertaking was required because the warrant said Hahui had been notified of the trial under Romanian procedure.
The warrant said he was summoned at his residence and that a notice was posted at the Local Council of Suceava. In an affidavit, Hahui said he left Romania in February 1999, had not known about the proceedings when he left and had not received or seen the notices. He said he first learned of the case around 2003 through a telephone conversation with a friend.
The judge found the affidavit did not provide cogent evidence to displace the issuing authority’s statement that Hahui had been notified. The court therefore concluded that a section 45 undertaking was not required.
Hahui also disputed whether the warrant’s account established correspondence with robbery under Irish law, arguing that it did not expressly set out dishonest intent or lack of the victim’s consent. The warrant described Hahui and another person striking two people on a staircase in a block of flats on 26 May 1998, then taking a leather handbag containing cash in four foreign currencies. The Minister argued that the described use of force to steal met the Irish definition of robbery; she also submitted that the facts disclosed assault.
The judge concluded that the circumstances described in the warrant established correspondence with both robbery and assault. The court said the striking of a victim with an implement, knocking him down and taking the bag demonstrated lack of consent and dishonest intent.
Having found no other legal bar to surrender, the High Court made the surrender order. The judgment does not state that Hahui was surrendered or address any subsequent appeal or retrial.