Vasile Stanciu v Procurator General's Office of the Republic of Armenia
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Mr Justice Jay |
| Judgment Date | 23 December 2022 |
| Neutral Citation | [2022] EWHC 3368 (Admin) |
| Docket Number | Case No: CO/2559/2021 |
| Court | King's Bench Division (Administrative Court) |
[2022] EWHC 3368 (Admin)
Lord Justice Bean
Mr Justice Jay
Case No: CO/2559/2021
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
KING'S BENCH DIVISION
DIVISIONAL COURT
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
Graeme L Hall (instructed by Lawrence & Co Solicitors LLP) for the Appellant
Adam Payter (instructed by CPS Extradition Unit) for the Respondent
Hearing date: 20 th December 2022
Approved Judgment
This judgment was handed down remotely at 10.30am on 23 December 2022 by circulation to the parties or their representatives by e-mail and by release to the National Archives.
This is the judgment of the Court.
On 15 th May 2020 the Procurator General's Office of the Republic of Armenia (“the Respondent”) issued a request for the extradition to Armenia of Mr Vasile Stanciu (“the Appellant”) for the purpose of his prosecution for four offences of theft, attempted theft, the manufacture and sale of forged payment documents, and attempt to commit crimes. Part 2 of the Extradition Act 2003 (“the 2003 Act”) applies to these proceedings. Although Armenia is not on the designated list for the purposes of Part 1, it is a member of the Council of Europe.
Following the certification of the request by the Secretary of State, the Appellant was arrested on 16 th July 2020 pursuant to a warrant issued by Westminster Magistrates' Court. The Appellant was remanded in custody where he has remained throughout these proceedings.
After a two-day hearing on 13 th and 14 th May 2021, on 27 th May District Judge Michael Snow (“the Judge”) rejected the Appellant's various arguments that he should not be extradited. The case was then sent to the Secretary of State who on 1 st June 2021 ordered his extradition to Armenia.
The Appellant now appeals to this Court with the leave of Fordham J limited to one issue: namely, whether the Judge was wrong to conclude that the Appellant's extradition did not expose him to a real risk of detention in inhuman or degrading prison conditions, contrary to Article 3 of the ECHR. Fordham J gave detailed reasons ( [2022] EWHC 1529 (Admin)) for granting permission on this ground, for which we are grateful.
After the hearing before the Judge, and indeed after the hearing before Fordham J, further evidence from the Appellant and further information and assurances from the Respondent have been provided. The parties are not in agreement as to the extent to which this further material is admissible on an appeal to this Court under section 103 of the 2003 Act. But before that dispute is considered, we must address the course of the litigation before the Judge.
THE PROCEEDINGS BEFORE THE JUDGE
The Evidence
The Judge received oral evidence from Mr Arshak Gasparyan who was put forward by the Appellant as an expert in prison conditions in Armenia. However the Judge, applying the decision of Collins J in Brazuks v Latvia [2014] EWHC 1021 (Admin), concluded that Mr Gasparyan was not an expert for the purpose of assessing the Article 3 risks in relation to the prison at issue. He had done no more than produce open source material in his two reports, and his visits to a number of prisons in Armenia took place some time ago. Fordham J ruled that the Judge's conclusion was not arguably wrong on this topic.
For the avoidance of doubt, we consider that had Mr Gasparyan visited the relevant prison, Armavir, in the recent past, his evidence of what he observed would have been admissible as evidence of fact. That he was not an expert would have gone to its weight and not to admissibility.
The open source material before the Judge comprised a 2016 report from the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (“CPT”), US State Department reports from 2019 and 2020, the Public Monitoring Group's (“PMG”) reports from 2018 and 2019, and an Ombudsman's report from 2019.
The CPT had visited a number of prisons in Armenia in October 2015. The report itself was published in March 2016 and the Government of Armenia responded to it in October that year. Given that, save in one respect, the Appellant did not contend before the Judge that there was a systemic problem in Armenia's prisons, we may properly focus on the CPT's findings in relation to Armavir prison which was where the Judge found that the Appellant would if extradited be held on remand. We will be addressing in due course the submission of Mr Graeme Hall for the Appellant that the ambit of our inquiry should be broader.
The 2016 CPT report was critical of that prison in terms of the lack of any proper ventilation system (described as a “serious problem inside the cells, the sanitary areas and the kitchen”), signs of significant wear and tear (somewhat surprising, given that the establishment had only opened in early 2015), and the size of the exercise yards. Further, prisoners were locked up in their cells for 21–23 hours a day.
The systemic issue which formed part of the Appellant's Article 3 case and was remarked on by the CPT concerned the existence of an informal criminal hierarchy and consequent corruption, violence and intimidation. The 2016 CPT report characterised the problem in these terms:
“No allegations of ill-treatment by staff were received by any of the penitentiary establishments visited, and staff-prisoner relations appeared generally free of visible tension. However, the delegation once again observed that there was a general tendency for the management to partially delegate authority to a select number of inmates (the so-called ‘watchers’) who were at the top of the informal prison hierarchy and use them to keep control over the inmate population. The CPT called upon the Armenian authorities to take resolute steps to put an end to this practice.
…
The management at Noubarashen and Armavir prisons openly stated that the very low staff complement rendered this policy almost unavoidable. …
The CPT must reiterate its view that such an approach constitutes not only a potential threat to good order within prisons but also a high-risk situation in terms of inter-prisoner intimidation, and leads to a culture of inequality of treatment between inmates. It is noteworthy that the delegation saw in the relevant documentation that requests for voluntary isolation were quite frequent in the prisons visited; at least some of the requests were expressly motivated by the prisoners' fear of their fellow inmates (and of the prisoner hierarchy) and staff acknowledged the existence of the problem.”
In sum:
“The CPT calls upon the Armenian authorities to take resolute steps to address the above-mentioned phenomena. It wishes to be informed of the concrete steps that will be taken to bring an end to these practices and of the timeframe within which they will be implemented.”
The Government of Armenia's response to the 2016 CPT report contained the following assertion:
“All the cells, sanitary annexes and the kitchen at Armavir Penitentiary Establishment are provided with proper ventilation (natural ventilation). The storage facilities are fully provided with ventilation systems as well …”
It was not being said that the cells etc. possessed a ventilation system, nor was it explained how “natural ventilation” might be effective during periods of hot weather in the south of the country.
As for the prevalence of inter-prisoner violence, the Government of Armenia declared:
“In all cases when persons try to intentionally violate the requirements of the internal regulations of penitentiary institutions, try to establish hierarchy amongst convicts, as well as wish to circumvent the legitimate demands of penitentiary officers in any way, various legitimate means – ranging from subjecting to disciplinary liability to sending to penitentiary institutions with a higher level of security – are unavoidably applied. For example, during 2015–6 ‘transfer to punishment cell’ disciplinary penalty has been imposed 1,649 times on persons attempting to establish hierarchical positions among convicts, as well on those ignoring legitimate demands of the penitentiary officers.
The Penitentiary service is in complete control of the operational situation at penitentiary institutions and – if necessary – undertakes respective actions to prevent cases of unofficial hierarchy.”
The US State Department reports provide useful summaries of the reports from others. Its report from 2020 noted that “Armavir penitentiary… did not have an air ventilation or cooling system, which allowed recorded cell temperatures [to be] as high as 113 degrees Fahrenheit in past summers”. The Ombudsman had referred to summer highs of 45 degrees Centigrade, effectively the same figure. In both 2019 and 2020 the US State Department described Armenian prison conditions as marked by “predation by hierarchical criminal structures (‘thieves-in-law’)”.
The 2018 PMG report provided little information about Armavir prison although it was noted that there was no ventilation system, which was said to be a systemic problem. This report identified what it called the “criminal subculture and hierarchical relations” as “the reason for the majority of problems in the penitentiary institutions”. Its conclusion was as follows:
“During the second half of 2018, after the political changes in the country, the RA Ministry of Justice expressed readiness and willingness to fight against the criminal sub-subcultures [sic], hierarchic relations and corruption existing [in] the penitentiary institutions. However, the members of the Monitoring Group did not record any positive change in this regard in the outcomes of its constant visits to the penitentiary institutions. The Monitoring Group is hopeful, the policy adopted by the RA Ministry of...
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