The High Court dismissed a Nigerian man’s challenge to a deportation order and discharged an injunction that had been restraining his deportation, while noting he could pursue further proceedings from outside Ireland.
The case concerned T.A., who arrived in Ireland in 2000 and was convicted by a jury of sexual assault in 2011. He was sentenced to four years in prison. At sentencing, the judge recommended that he be deported on release. The High Court judgment records that T.A. was released in February 2014 and that his permission to remain was revoked in June that year.
T.A. later sought permission to remain based on his parentage of his Irish-citizen daughter, L.A.P., who was born in Ireland in 2015. The Minister refused that application in 2016 and made a deportation order in June 2017. T.A. and his daughter brought judicial review proceedings in August 2017.
Justice Richard Humphreys found that the challenge failed on its legal merits. He rejected claims that the Minister had denied T.A. a fair opportunity to make submissions, acted irrationally, or unlawfully assessed the family’s rights and the child’s interests. The judge said the Minister had considered the child’s interests and was entitled to weigh them against the public interest in deportation.
The court also rejected the argument that EU free-movement rules required the matter to be handled through a removal process rather than a deportation order. The judge found that T.A. had not acquired rights under the relevant 2004 directive because his Danish wife had left Ireland before the directive took effect.
Separately, Justice Humphreys said the proceedings should be dismissed on discretionary grounds even if any part of his merits analysis were wrong. He pointed to the court’s findings about T.A.’s immigration history, serious criminal conviction, and period in Ireland without permission.
In a postscript, the judge considered whether to continue the injunction pending any appeal. He said the evidence gave little detail about T.A.’s relationship with his daughter and that he could pursue further proceedings from outside the State. The court therefore discharged the injunction restraining deportation. The judgment did not determine the outcome of any appeal or further proceedings.