The High Court has ordered Paul James John Joseph Johnston’s surrender to Northern Ireland under two European Arrest Warrants: one seeking the balance of a life sentence for murder and the other seeking his return to stand trial for being unlawfully at large.
In a judgment delivered on 7 March 2019, Ms Justice Donnelly rejected Johnston’s objections to surrender under both warrants. She was satisfied that the warrants were properly endorsed and that the statutory requirements for surrender were met. The order directs his surrender to a person authorised by the issuing state to receive him.
Johnston argued that his arrest and detention at Kilmainham Garda Station in May 2017, initially for a drugs search, had been a device to keep him available for the first warrant. He said that the circumstances tainted both warrants. The court heard conflicting accounts from Johnston and Gardaí about the roadside stop, items seen in his car and the reasons for his detention. A custody record initially described him as unlawfully at large before that entry was crossed out and replaced with a reference to a search under drugs legislation.
The judge accepted Garda evidence that officers had a genuine basis to investigate possible drug possession and detained Johnston for searches of him and the vehicle. She also found that Gardaí had a reasonable suspicion he had escaped from lawful custody in Northern Ireland and were entitled to charge him with that offence under Irish law. Any mistaken belief about their search or detention powers, she said, did not amount to a deliberate and conscious violation of his rights. She found no abuse of process and rejected the argument that the detention tainted the warrants.
The court also dismissed Johnston’s arguments concerning detention conditions and the risk of inhuman or degrading treatment. The judge found he had not provided cogent, specific and objective evidence establishing a real risk if surrendered. She said the Parole Commissioners’ decision that he should remain confined was for the issuing state to resolve.
The second warrant concerned the allegation that Johnston failed to return to Maghaberry Prison after temporary release on 27 April 2017. The court found the described conduct corresponded to the Irish offence of being unlawfully at large. It also rejected his claim that the withdrawal and striking out of an earlier District Court charge amounted to a final judgment barring surrender on that warrant.