JZ (Colombia) v Secretary of State for the Home Department

Whether a person constitutes a danger to the community requires consideration of both the likelihood of reoffending and the seriousness of the harm that may result. A low risk may suffice where the possible reoffending would involve a very serious offence. A serious conviction does not, by itself, establish continuing dangerousness. The question is factual. In an Article 8 claim, the tribunal must engage with the material family-life and private-life issues and give adequate reasons; removal with family members may nevertheless be proportionate where the evidence supports that conclusion.

The appellant, a Colombian citizen who had entered the United Kingdom with his wife and two sons, challenged deportation after conviction for importing a substantial quantity of cocaine and a ten-year sentence. He relied on evidence said to show a low risk of reoffending and on Article 8 family and private life. The Asylum and Immigration Tribunal dismissed his appeal and, on reconsideration, maintained its decision. A renewed application for permission to appeal was brought to the Court of Appeal. The issues were whether the tribunal had properly assessed dangerousness under article 33(2) of the Refugee Convention and section 72 of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002, and whether it had adequately considered proportionality under Article 8.

1. Danger to the community. The renewed application was dismissed. The statutory words did not require the additional threshold of a significant risk of serious harm. The assessment was factual and had to take account of both the risk of recurrence and the gravity of the event that might occur. A low risk of reoffending could therefore support a finding of dangerousness, or fail to rebut the presumption, where the possible offence would be very serious.
2. The fact of a serious conviction did not mean that the appellant necessarily remained dangerous. It was, however, plainly relevant to the forward-looking assessment. The tribunal was entitled to conclude that a person presenting a low risk of committing another very serious offence could still constitute a danger to the community.
3. Article 8. The tribunal had given sufficient reasons showing that it considered the material evidence concerning family life and private life. Its findings that the family could return together to Colombia and that the appellant’s recent private life had been limited were reasonably open to it. Any possible failure to consider proportionality on the basis that the family could return as a unit was immaterial, since no proper finding of disproportionate removal could have been made on those facts.
4. The Court of Appeal saw no real prospect that the Article 8 claim had been wrongly rejected. The application for permission to appeal was refused.

• Asylum and Immigration Tribunal: dismissed the appellant’s appeal against the deportation decision and his Article 8 claim; on reconsideration, confirmed the decision.
• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): dismissed the renewed application for permission to appeal and refused the application.