The High Court has ordered the surrender of Traian Sava to Romania under a European Arrest Warrant issued on 22 February 2023, to enforce a sentence of two years and 10 months’ imprisonment.
In a judgment delivered on 29 November 2023, Mr Justice Kerida Naidoo said the sentence had been imposed on 19 January 2023 and became final on 15 February. The full sentence remained to be served. The order was made under section 16 of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003.
The warrant before the court was the fifth issued in relation to Mr Sava. The judgment records that earlier warrants were withdrawn or superseded, and that a fourth warrant from a different Romanian court, concerning overlapping sentences, was also withdrawn. The High Court said the fifth warrant was the only one still before it and covered the offences dealt with in the earlier warrants.
Mr Sava objected that, because he had not attended the hearing resulting in the sentence under the fifth warrant, he might not have an effective right to challenge the sentences combined into the final term. The issuing authority stated that after surrender he would be personally served with the judgment and informed of a right to appeal or seek a retrial. The judge concluded that this right would allow him to challenge the conviction and sentence, including how the sentence was calculated, and that section 45 did not prohibit surrender.
The court also rejected his abuse-of-process argument, which relied in part on the successive warrants and convictions in absentia. The judge said issuing more than one warrant was not, by itself, an abuse, and found that the withdrawal of the fourth warrant resolved the potential conflict or uncertainty arising from overlapping warrants. The court did not decide whether the circumstances strictly amounted to double jeopardy, saying that issue had been addressed by the withdrawal.
Mr Sava also relied on his family circumstances and rights to a fair trial and liberty. His affidavit said he supported his family and two children through work for a car valeting company, and that his family was happy in Ireland and hoped to live there after the warrant proceedings. The judge found those grounds, alone or together, were not sufficiently exceptional to prevent surrender.
The court was satisfied that no statutory bar applied and ordered surrender to Romania in respect of the fifth warrant. The judgment does not decide the outcome of any appeal or retrial in Romania.