King’s Prosecutor, Brussels v Cando Armas and Another: Admn 20 Aug 2004

The prisoner had argued that the alleged offence underlying the application for his extradition to Belgium had been committed in part in England, and was therefore not extradictable. The prosecutor appealed.
Held: Part I of the 2003 Act was intended to be a complete code and part of the European arrest warrant scheme, intended to facilitate extradition between member states. Many offences are now transnational, and it would be highly regrettable if they were not extradictable. There was nothing in the language of s65 to exclude the applications of subsections (3) to (6) from being framework offences. ‘The conduct’ in 65(2) meant such of the conduct as constituted a criminal offence onder the law of the territory to which the Act was being applied, and the case was remitted to eth District Judge to apply that test. Section 65(2) to (6) formed a list, that conduct constituted an extradition offence if it fell within any of these subsections, which were not mutually exclusive, and that there was no reason to confine subsections (3) to (6) to non-framework list offences. The court construed ‘the conduct’ in section 65(2) to (6) to mean ‘such of the conduct as constitutes a criminal offence (under the law of the category 1 territory)’, and held that the present case fell within both (2) and (3) of section 65.

Judges:

Henriques and Stanley Burnton JJ

Citations:

[2004] EWHC 2019 (Admin), Times 08-Oct-2004, [2005] 1 WLR 1389, [2005] 2 All ER 181

Links:

Bailii

Statutes:

Extradition Act 2003 28 65(2), Council Framework Decision on a European arrest warrant: COM/2001/0522 final – CNS 2001/0215

Jurisdiction:

England and Wales

Cited by:

Appeal fromOffice of the King’s Prosecutor, Brussels v Cando Armas and others HL 17-Nov-2005
The defendant resisted extradition to Brussels saying that the offence had been committed in part in England. He had absconded and been convicted. Application was made for his return to serve his sentence. The offences associated with organisation . .
CitedKrzyzowski v Circuit Court In Gliwice, Poland Admn 23-Nov-2007
Extradition of the defendant to Poland was sought, the court saying he had fled his trial for burglaries in 1999. The defendant argued that his extradition would now be unfair.
Held: The judge was right to hold that his ruling of deliberate . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Extradition

Updated: 11 June 2022; Ref: scu.200349