Regina v Governor of Pentonville Prison ex parte Cheng: HL 16 Apr 1973

Lord Diplock traced the history of the political offence exception to offences requiring extradition, and emphasised the need for a connection between the impugned conduct and changes to government or government policy: ‘My Lords, the noun that is qualified by the adjectival phrase ‘of a political character,’ is ‘offence.’ One must, therefore, consider what are the juristic elements in an offence, particularly one which is an extradition crime, to which the epithet ‘political’ can apply. I would accept that it applies to the mental element: the state of mind of the accused when he did the act which constitutes the physical element in the offence with which he is charged. I would accept, too, that the relevant state of mind is not restricted to the intent necessary to constitute the offence with which he is charged, for in the case of none of the extradition crimes can this properly be described as being political. The relevant mental element must involve some less immediate object which the accused sought to achieve by doing the physical act. It is unnecessary for the purposes of the present appeal, and would, in my view, be unwise, to attempt to define how remote that object might be. If the accused had robbed a bank in order to obtain funds to support a political party, the object would, in my view, clearly be too remote to constitute a political offence. But if the accused had killed a dictator in the hope of changing the government of the country, his object would be sufficiently immediate to justify the epithet ‘political.’ For politics are about government. ‘Political’ as descriptive of an object to be achieved must, in my view, be confined to the object of overthrowing or changing the government of a state or inducing it to change its policy or escaping from its territory the better so to do. No doubt any act done with any of these objects would be a ‘political act,’ whether or not it was done within the territory of the government against whom it was aimed. But the question is not simply whether it is political qua ‘act’ but whether it is political qua ‘offence.’

Judges:

Lord Diplock, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, Lord Hodson

Citations:

[1973] AC 931, [1973] UKHL 8, [1973] 2 WLR 746, [1973] 2 All ER 204, [1973] Crim LR 362

Links:

Bailii

Statutes:

Extradition Act 1870 3(1)

Jurisdiction:

England and Wales

Cited by:

ConsideredT v Secretary of State for the Home Department HL 22-May-1996
The applicant for asylum had been involved in an airport bomb attack killing 10 people. Asylum had been refused on the basis that this was a non-political crime. Though the organisation had political objectives, those were only indirectly associated . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Extradition

Updated: 10 June 2022; Ref: scu.195751