The High Court has ordered James O’Gara committed to prison to await the Minister’s decision on his extradition to the United States, where he is sought for trial over an alleged bank robbery. The order followed a hearing under section 29 of the Extradition Act 1965; it is not a finding that he committed the alleged offence or a final ministerial decision to extradite him.
The US alleges that a man robbed a bank in the Bronx, New York, on 2 April 2007, taking about $12,260 after displaying a handgun. Prosecutors allege that witnesses saw O’Gara run towards his home and that investigators recovered clothing, a handgun and the money nearby. An FBI laboratory report was said to have found that DNA from O’Gara matched DNA on clothing attributed to the robber. A US grand jury indicted him on a bank robbery charge in April 2008. These are allegations described in the extradition materials, not findings made at this hearing.
O’Gara’s objection focused on conditions in US prisons. His lawyers argued that prison rape and other violence, along with restrictions on prisoners’ ability to bring legal claims, created a real risk that extradition would breach his rights to bodily integrity and human dignity and the European Convention on Human Rights prohibition on inhuman or degrading treatment. They relied on reports and expert evidence about sexual violence, prison conditions and the Prison Litigation Reform Act.
The court said a presumption that a country would respect a person’s rights applied in conventional extradition cases, but was weaker and more readily rebutted than the presumption in European arrest warrant cases. It found the evidence was sufficient to displace that presumption and require an examination of the risk. The court then assessed the research, including studies that reported differing rates of sexual victimisation and had limitations in their methods and scope.
The judge concluded that the evidence did not establish a real risk that O’Gara, in particular, would suffer a breach of his rights if extradited. The objection rested on general criticism of the US prison system, without evidence that a characteristic specific to O’Gara made him especially vulnerable, the judgment said. The court therefore dismissed the objections and made the statutory committal order, leaving the Minister to decide the next step under the extradition process.