The High Court has refused to order the surrender of a man to Poland under a European Arrest Warrant, finding it was not satisfied that he had fled Poland to evade justice before he was required to serve a prison sentence.
The judgment by Mr Justice Edwards concerned a warrant seeking the man’s return to serve a sentence of one year and two months imposed by the District Court in Gdynia in 2004. The warrant was issued in January 2009 and endorsed for execution in Ireland in March 2010. The man was arrested in June 2010. His identity was not disputed.
The court considered the version of section 10 of the European Arrest Warrant Act applicable to the case. It required the court to be satisfied that the man had fled Poland before beginning or completing his sentence. Applying Supreme Court guidance, the judge said “fled” meant more than simply leaving; it connoted an escape from justice.
The sentence had initially been conditionally suspended for four years. Information from the Polish judicial authority said the suspension was lifted in February 2006 after the man was convicted of two further offences committed during the probation period. He was later required to report to serve the sentence but did not do so.
In affidavits, the man said he left Poland for Ireland in September 2005 to seek work and support his estranged wife and children. He said he had notified his probation officer and the Gdynia authorities, provided a contact address, and understood he did not have to attend the hearing at which he was convicted of the further offences. The applicant did not dispute that he had notified the authorities of his plan to travel, and no evidence was put forward that he was prohibited from going abroad.
The judge said some of the man’s evidence lacked sufficient force, including his unsupported account that a later postponement of the sentence had been revoked after a complaint about unpaid rent. But, weighing all the evidence, the court was not satisfied that he left to evade justice rather than to seek employment. The judge gave him the benefit of the doubt that he may have hoped to obtain a postponement and may have been prepared to return when required.
The court therefore declined to make a surrender order under section 16. It did not decide the man’s separate argument that surrender could lead to him being required to serve the sentences imposed for the 2005 offences, which he said would breach the rule of specialty. The judge said that issue did not need to be determined after the section 10 objection succeeded.