Adina-Gabriela Prisacariu v Judecatoria Suceava, Romania
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Mr Justice Kerr |
| Judgment Date | 28 February 2022 |
| Neutral Citation | [2022] EWHC 538 (Admin) |
| Docket Number | No. CO/3825/2020 |
| Court | Queen's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
[2022] EWHC 538 (Admin)
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
Royal Courts of Justice
THE HONOURABLE Mr Justice Kerr
No. CO/3825/2020
Mr Martin Henley (instructed by AM International Solicitors) appeared for the Appellant.
Ms Rebecca Hill (instructed by Crown Prosecution Service) appeared for the Respondent.
Introduction and Summary
The appellant appeals with permission of Murray J against a decision of District Judge Branston in a reserved judgment given on 15 October 2020 at the Westminster Magistrates' Court to extradite her to Romania to serve a sentence of five years and two months' imprisonment for nine offences.
Seven of the offences, committed in 2015 and 2016, are of smuggling hundreds of thousands of cigarettes. The other two offences, committed in April and December 2015, involved driving a car in Suceava, Romania, while disqualified. The second of them also involved the appellant crashing the car and causing injury to three persons.
Permission to appeal was, initially, refused on the papers by Steyn J, but was granted by Murray J at an oral hearing on 18 March 2021. For various reasons, it has taken some time for this substantive appeal hearing to take place. The appellant is on conditional bail. The sentence remains unserved.
There is also outstanding an application to rely on a further witness statement of the appellant made on 9 January 2022, following a recent social services report from Brent Council (“Brent”) — directed by the court to be provided — about the care of the appellant's two-year old daughter. The respondent judicial authority does not oppose that application and I grant it. I have therefore considered that additional evidence.
Facts
The appellant is a Romanian citizen from Suceava in the northeast, near the Ukrainian border. She was born on 3 February 1994 and is now 28. In May 2014, the appellant married her then husband. In August 2014, he died in a car accident in which she was the driver. She suffered serious injury. Her licence was retained by the police and not restored to her.
The offences the appellant committed, as shown in the relevant European arrest warrant (“EAW”), were in slightly more detail, as follows. First, during 2015, she joined an organised crime group (offence (1)) which carried out many acts of smuggling. Those were as follows.
(1) in August 2015, transporting 30,000 cigarettes in the amount of 7,000 RON (offence (2)) (in pounds sterling, about £1,180);
(2) on 12 November 2015, transport of 30,000 cigarettes in the amount of 7,300 RON (offence (3));
(3) on 25 November 2015, transport of 90,000 cigarettes which she obtained from a co-defendant (offence (4));
(4) on November 2015, transport of 70,000 cigarettes (offence (5));
(5) on 7 December 2015, smuggling of 20,000 cigarettes (offence (6));
(6) on 6 January 2016, transport of 59,960 cigarettes that she subsequently sold to a co-defendant (offence (7));
(7) Also, on 26 April 2015, she drove a BMW car and caused an accident which resulted in property damages and bodily injuries while driving without a licence (offence (8).
(8) On 26 December 2015, driving a car on a street in Suceava, having been disqualified from driving “and at a crossroads, lost control of the car, crossed the carriageway, struck the crash barrier on the left side, overturned at about 7 metres from the road, as a result of which three persons suffered trauma injuries” (offence (9)).
According to certain further information provided by the judicial authority on 24 October 2016, the appellant took over the smuggling operations of her husband after he died. The appellant's role in that operation was to cross the border with Ukraine at the Siret crossing point, obtain the cigarettes there, bring them back across the border into Romania and sell them there to a client or contact known to her.
From 7 January 2016, the appellant was detained and was then under house arrest up to 20 October 2016.
However, during that period, in June 2016, the appellant travelled to the UK. Despite the reference in the documents to house arrest, she was not prohibited from travelling but was obliged to notify the authorities of any change of address. She then returned to Romania, to house arrest and to her trial in Romania.
On 10 October 2016, the appellant was tried in person, with co-defendants, and was legally represented.
On 24 October 2016, she was convicted of taking part in a criminal organisation and smuggling.
After that, she was involved in various further judicial proceedings in Romania, including conviction for the two driving offences and an appeal against sentence.
The judge found that the appellant moved to this country from March 2017. Her sister was already here with her husband. The appellant obtained work as a cleaner and lived in a shared house.
A previous EAW (which I will call the “first warrant” or “EAW (1)”) was issued at some point before 25 October 2017. I do not know when. It was said to relate to eight offences. However, it does not refer to either of the driving offences.
On 25 October 2017, the appellant was arrested in this country pursuant to the first warrant EAW(1). It was a conviction warrant.
On 29 November 2017, she was released on conditional bail.
On 15 December 2017, District Judge Gary Lucie discharged the appellant, pursuant to section 21 of the Extradition Act 2003 (“the Act”) and Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (“ECHR”) for want of an adequate assurance concerning prison conditions in Romania.
On 30 May 2018 (according to the second EAW and here the operative one, to which I am coming), a sentence of imprisonment was imposed on the appellant. I do not here mention the length of that sentence because it was for multiple offending, was later appealed and it is unnecessary to navigate the twists and turns of the complex sentencing exercise that took place.
It is necessary to mention here that the appellant had by this time formed a relationship in Romania with a Mr Indrai Coman. In about late July 2018, they conceived a child together. That was in the middle of the judicial process in Romania involving consideration at several separate first instance and appeal hearings reviewing the sentences of this appellant and of several of her co-accused.
I mention the timing of the child's conception because of the submission of the appellant, through Mr Henley, that Romania's failure to provide the prison assurance required by the court in the proceedings under the first warrant has, to quote from Mr Henley's skeleton argument, “resulted in the birth of a child”.
On 17 December 2018, the appellant's sentence became “modified and final” in the Court of Appeal of Suceava (see EAW(2), box B). The explanation of this from the judicial authority came in later further information (provided on 29 August 2019) as follows:
“By the penal sentence no. 281 of 30.05.2018 of Suceava Court remained final by the criminal decision no. 1198 of 17.12 .2018 of Suceava Court of Appeal it was canceled the mandate for the execution of the prison sentence issued on the basis of file no. 832/91 12016 of Vrancea Court and a new mandate for the execution of the sentence was issued at the final stay respectively on 17.12.2018 Suceava Court.”
While this is not easy to follow, the judge below managed to deconstruct the complex trial and sentencing process and found, in my view correctly, that the overall and final sentence for all the offences was, indeed, one of five years and two months' imprisonment (replacing earlier sentences) and that it was imposed on 17 December 2018. Thus, as the judge found, the appellant became unlawfully at large from that date, 17 December 2018.
A second conviction warrant (the second warrant or EAW(2)) was then issued. It referred to eight offences and these now included the two driving offences, which were treated as one, although the driving incidents occurred about six months apart, in April and December 2015.
The EAW(2) was certified by the National Crime Agency on 28 December 2018.
The appellant's daughter, Cielline Coman, was born on 21 April 2019. Therefore she is now two years ten months old.
On 26 June 2019, the appellant surrendered, by arrangement, voluntarily, at a police station in Belgravia, London, was arrested and brought before the Westminster Magistrates' Court that day. She was granted conditional bail.
The extradition hearing was listed three times in 2019: 8 August, 11 October and 10 December of that year. The purpose of the adjournments was threefold; first, for assurances relating to prison conditions to be obtained from Romania; second, for a welfare report from Brent to be provided on the issue of care for the child, Cielline; and third, to allow the judicial...
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