The High Court ruled that delay alone was not a lawful basis to refuse Poland’s request to prosecute a man who had already been surrendered there, and granted consent for the further prosecution.
In a judgment delivered on 24 June 2016, Ms Justice Donnelly considered a request under section 22 of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003. The request concerned an alleged burglary of a computer shop in Poland on 7 July 2006. The judgment does not identify the shop’s location.
An arrest warrant had issued in June 2010 for the respondent to serve custodial sentences imposed in Poland. He was surrendered there in August 2013. After a decision of the Regional Court in Tarnow in September 2015, Polish authorities requested consent to prosecute him for the alleged burglary.
The respondent argued that the time between the alleged offence and the request was oppressive and breached his constitutional rights. His submission, as the court understood it, was that delay itself should be enough to refuse consent. The Minister for Justice and Equality argued that consent was governed by the statutory refusal grounds and that delay was not an independent ground.
The judge found the respondent had provided no evidence of a risk to a fair trial or of deficiencies in Poland’s trial system. Applying the statutory presumption that Poland would respect the respondent’s fundamental rights, she concluded that the claimed delay did not establish a real risk of an egregious fair trial breach under section 37.
The judgment also addressed whether the court could refuse consent outside the grounds in section 22(8). It said abuse of process could, in principle, justify refusal through the court’s inherent power to protect its own processes. No abuse of process argument was pressed in this case. Apart from that power, the court held that refusal was limited to cases covered by section 22(8).
The court concluded that “delay simpliciter” was not a ground to refuse consent for further prosecution after surrender. It found no abuse of process or breach of the respondent’s constitutional or European Convention rights, and granted consent for Poland to prosecute him for the offence described in its request. The ruling determined the consent request; it did not decide whether the respondent committed the alleged burglary.