The High Court refused to halt the deportation of Mohammad Khan while he pursues a judicial review of the Minister for Justice’s refusal to revoke his deportation order. It also refused a stay after being told arrangements were in place to deport him to Pakistan the following morning.
In an ex tempore judgment delivered on 23 April 2013, Mr Justice Colm Mac Eochaidh granted Khan leave to challenge the refusal to revoke the order. The court stressed that the validity of the deportation order itself had not been challenged in the proceedings before it.
Khan had first received an interim injunction on 19 April, pending the return hearing. The judge said the injunction application arose after the applicants sought to amend their proceedings to include the Minister’s decision, made the previous day, not to revoke the order. The court granted leave for that judicial review challenge but refused interlocutory relief.
The judgment recounted that Khan, who was born in Pakistan and arrived in Ireland in 2007, had a deportation decision dated 1 November 2012. He married the second applicant, Victoria Khan, in January 2013 and applied to revoke the order about two weeks later. His application alleged that the Minister’s earlier decision had wrongly treated him as single and failed to account for his relationship and engagement. Khan said he had told the Refugee Legal Service about those circumstances; the judgment said it was unclear why they had not been fully conveyed to the Minister.
Applying Supreme Court guidance, the judge said deportation is generally not to be restrained unless countervailing circumstances are sufficiently weighty. He considered the marriage, Khan’s relationship with his wife’s children, and evidence that she was distressed and experiencing anxiety and sleep difficulties. He concluded those circumstances did not justify an injunction, noting the marriage was recent and no children faced deportation in this case.
The judge said an expedited hearing could reduce disruption and that the High Court would retain seisin to ensure the challenge was determined quickly. He later refused a stay pending an application to appeal to the Supreme Court. He said refusing a stay did not remove access to that court, which could undo the order’s effects if it found the law had been misapplied.