The High Court has ordered the surrender of Maciej Leopold to Poland on one attempted fraud count, while refusing surrender on five other counts in the warrant before it. Ms Justice Donnelly made the order under section 16(1) of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003 on 30 January 2020.
Poland sought Mr Leopold’s surrender to prosecute him for six alleged offences said to have been committed between 2002 and 2006. The judge described the warrant as the fifth request concerning these offences. Earlier warrants and proceedings had resulted in changes to the offences pursued, and Mr Leopold had been released in 2011 after an earlier surrender order was not carried out within the required time.
The central issue was whether an earlier High Court decision, which refused surrender on five of the six offences, prevented those questions from being reconsidered. Justice Donnelly concluded that the earlier decision created an issue estoppel on whether the offences corresponded to offences under Irish law. She said the current warrant contained the same request and facts and did not correct a defect or provide new information. She therefore refused surrender on counts C/I, II, III and IV, and the single offence in count D.
The remaining count, Offence V, had previously been found to correspond to attempted deception to make a gain or cause a loss, contrary to section 6 of the Criminal Justice (Theft and Fraud) Offences Act 2001. The judge said she was bound by that earlier finding too. She then separately considered whether surrender on that count would amount to an abuse of the High Court’s process.
The court considered the repeated warrants, delay, the failure to carry out the earlier surrender, Mr Leopold’s circumstances in Ireland and the age and seriousness of the allegation. The judge found that most of the delay was explained by Mr Leopold’s efforts to address matters in Poland and by time needed for courts to resolve legal issues. She said the initial failure to surrender resulted from an interpretation error by the Minister, which she did not consider grossly negligent. She found no bad faith, improper motive or abuse of process, even when the factors were considered together.
The judge said the alleged offence was non-violent but not insignificant, with a maximum penalty of eight years’ imprisonment. She also found no other bar to surrender under section 16. The order applies only to Count V; it does not determine Mr Leopold’s guilt, which is for proceedings in Poland.