The High Court ordered Jaroslaw Stankiewicz’s surrender to Poland under a European arrest warrant, rejecting his objection that he did not fall within the surrender provisions because he had not fled the country.
In a judgment delivered on 6 May 2008, Mr Justice Michael Peart said the respondent had not rebutted the presumption that Poland would not seek surrender where he had complied with the conditions attached to his suspended sentence. The judge said Mr Stankiewicz’s assertion that he left Poland to seek work, and had not breached any conditions, was not supported by enough evidence.
The warrant, issued in Poland on 26 September 2007, sought his return to serve a sentence imposed on 15 January 2001. It stated that one year, two months and 14 days remained. The sentence had initially been suspended for five years. The judgment says the suspension was lifted on 19 May 2005 after he was convicted of a further offence on 18 November 2004, during the probation period.
Mr Stankiewicz said in an affidavit that he left Poland in March 2005 to find work in Ireland and had previously travelled to Germany for work with his lawyer’s knowledge. He said no condition required him to remain in Poland, and that he did not know the suspension had been lifted until his arrest in Ireland. He also denied committing the later offence and said he had not instructed a lawyer to represent him in the proceedings to activate the suspended sentence.
The applicant’s information was that a lawyer represented him in the activation proceedings and that the sentence did not require him to live at a particular address. The judge said the conditions could have been obtained from the Polish court or with help from another lawyer. He held that the respondent had not provided the cogent evidence needed to establish that he had breached no conditions by leaving Poland.
The court also found that the respondent was the person named in the warrant, that the offences corresponded to offences under section 3 of Ireland’s Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act 1997, and that the outstanding sentence met the minimum gravity requirement. It found no statutory or other bar to surrender and made the order under section 16(1) of the European Arrest Warrant Act 2003, as amended.