The High Court ordered the surrender of Saulius Ferenca to Lithuania to serve a sentence of two years and nine months after considering objections to a European arrest warrant. The judgment was delivered by Mr Justice Michael Peart on 24 May 2007.
The Lithuanian warrant sought his surrender following convictions for three offences. The court found that the first offence, involving a payment card handed to others to be forged, did not correspond directly to an offence under Irish law: the warrant did not allege that Ferenca personally took part in making the false instrument. The judge said his inquiries had not identified another Irish offence matching those described acts.
For the second and third offences, concerning use of a forged card in an attempted camera purchase, the judge found that the conduct would amount to offences under Irish law. He accepted that correspondence was established for those two offences.
The respondent argued that surrender should not be ordered because the offences were not properly identified as fraud in the warrant and because the composite sentence could not be divided to establish the minimum sentence applicable to the offences that corresponded. The judge considered section 38 of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003. He concluded that surrender was not prohibited for the first offence because its conduct fell within a broad concept of fraud, despite the absence of a direct Irish equivalent and the warrant’s failure to tick the fraud category. He also concluded that the minimum gravity requirement was satisfied.
The judgment rejected other objections, including arguments about bail, ratification of the EU Framework Decision, the Lithuanian issuing authority and the absence of an undertaking concerning trial in the respondent’s presence. On the latter point, the judge accepted the warrant’s statement that Ferenca had attended the hearings and judgments. The respondent’s written submissions disputed his presence when a suspended sentence was lifted, but no supporting affidavit was filed. The judge held that lifting the suspension after a breach of its conditions did not amount to conviction or sentence in absentia for the purposes of section 45.
The court was satisfied that the arrested person was the person named in the warrant and that the statutory presumptions had not been rebutted. It ordered surrender under section 16. The judgment records the order; it does not establish that surrender was subsequently carried out.