The High Court has ordered Kornelija Kusec Durbek’s surrender to Croatia to face prosecution for two alleged offences of threat. Mr Justice Patrick McGrath made the order under section 16 of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003 on 11 December 2024.
The European arrest warrant, issued on 17 October 2022, alleges that Ms Durbek sent threatening messages in September and October 2021. The warrant says a voice message threatened to kill what Maja Kusec Cik cared about, and a later message threatened harm to children. The court’s judgment recounts the allegations; it does not determine whether they are true.
Ms Durbek objected that the alleged offences did not correspond to an Irish offence, that Croatia’s prosecution time limit may have expired, and that detention conditions could expose her to treatment contrary to Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights. She had also raised an objection based on where the alleged offences took place, but no longer pursued it after Croatia said the alleged victim was in Bjelovar when the threats were made.
The court rejected the limitation argument after Croatia’s issuing judicial authority said a 15-year limitation period applied to both offences. It found that the alleged acts would correspond to the Irish offence of threats to kill or cause serious harm. The court also found that the statutory grounds concerning matters under sections 22, 23 and 24 did not preclude surrender, and that the warrant met the minimum gravity requirement.
On prison conditions, the judge considered concerns raised in a European Committee for the Prevention of Torture report about accommodation for women in Croatian prisons, including overcrowding at Zagreb Prison’s Department No. 10. Croatian authorities said Ms Durbek would be held in Bjelovar for investigative detention and supplied information about that prison’s conditions. The judge accepted those assurances, finding no evidential basis to reject them.
The prosecution had proposed a combined 10-month sentence that would be suspended if Ms Durbek committed no new offence within two years. The judge said that sentence was not certain and that the location of any longer unconditional prison term was unclear. He nevertheless concluded that the evidence did not establish substantial grounds to believe surrender would expose Ms Durbek to a real risk of inhuman or degrading treatment. He rejected the Article 3 objection and ordered surrender. The judgment decides the surrender application; it does not decide the criminal charges.