Zakowski v Regional Court In Szczecin, Poland

A European Arrest Warrant must satisfy the mandatory requirements in section 2 of the Extradition Act 2003. The court must first determine from the warrant itself whether it is a Part 1 warrant. The warrant may be read as a whole, but its statutory requirements cannot be supplied by extraneous information. In a conviction case, particulars of the conviction may be established by the warrant’s overall terms, including references to the sentence and the convicted person. Section 2(6)(c) concerns particulars of another European Arrest Warrant issued in respect of the same offence, rather than a purely domestic arrest warrant. The statutory language should, so far as possible, be construed consistently with the Framework Decision. Questions concerning whether a person is unlawfully at large for the purposes of section 14 are evidential matters, not formal requirements of the warrant.

The appellant challenged the decision of District Judge Nicholas Evans dated 11 April 2008 ordering his surrender to Poland under a European Arrest Warrant. The warrant concerned a conviction arising from the theft of a bicycle and referred to a two-year sentence, a final decision of the Polish court, and an arrest warrant sent after the appellant.

The appellant argued that the warrant failed to provide particulars of the conviction and particulars of any other warrant as required by section 2(6)(b) and (c) of the Extradition Act 2003. He also sought to raise passage of time, but accepted that the district judge’s factual findings made that ground unsustainable.

1. Appeal dismissed. The district judge’s decision was affirmed.
2. The formal requirements in section 2 are mandatory. The court must first decide whether the warrant, on its face, is a Part 1 warrant. A deficient warrant cannot be supplemented by extraneous information, following Office of the King's Prosecutor, Brussels v Cando Armas and Dabas v High Court of Justice, Madrid.
3. The warrant satisfied section 2(6)(b). Read as a whole, its reference to a final decision, the sentence imposed, and the appellant’s failure to attend the detention institution showed that this was a conviction case and supplied proper particulars of the conviction. It was unnecessary to identify separately whether conviction and sentence occurred on the same date.
4. Section 2(6)(c) did not require particulars of the domestic warrant issued for failure to attend the detention institution. The reference to another warrant was limited to another European Arrest Warrant issued in respect of the offence for which extradition was sought. This construction followed the reasoning in Jaso, Lopez and Fernandez v Central Criminal Court No 2 Madrid.
5. The word “particulars” should not be construed more broadly than the corresponding requirement for information in article 8.1(c) of the Framework Decision. National legislation should, so far as possible, be interpreted consistently with that instrument, as explained in Propino, Dabas and Pelecki v Circuit Court of Lecniza.
6. The possible significance of a domestic warrant to whether a person was unlawfully at large arose under section 14, which concerned passage of time. That was a matter of evidence rather than a formal defect in the warrant.
7. The section 14 ground could not succeed because the appellant had been present when the sentence was activated in August 2004 and the relevant factual findings had not been displaced.

• District Judge: On 11 April 2008, District Judge Nicholas Evans ordered the appellant’s surrender to Poland under a European Arrest Warrant.
• High Court (Administrative Court): The statutory appeal was dismissed and the district judge’s decision affirmed.