[2025] EWHC 2783 (Admin)

There has not been any “usurpation” of the statutory extradition regime in the sense required by the first condition. The Judge held that the failure to issue a second request was due to a misunderstanding on the part of the State of Kuwait, a finding which Mr Smith accepts he was entitled to reach. It was an understanding that the disclosure which had openly been given to the CPS in December 2021 would have been understood to be disclosure of the commission of a criminal offence by the department responsible for prosecuting it; and that it was not necessary to issue a second request in order to comply with specialty obligations under article 11(1)(b) of the Treaty. Although at times Mr Smith’s submissions were framed in terms of deliberate misconduct, on the Judge’s findings there is no question of bad faith. The misunderstanding arose in relation to an absconding offence which was closely linked to the substantive offences of fraud and money laundering for which Mr Badie was awaiting trial and which were the subject matter of the existing extradition request, albeit that as now accepted the absconding offence does not fall within the exception to specialty in article 11(1)(b) of the Treaty as “any offence disclosed by the information submitted by the Requesting Party in respect of an offence for which the person has been extradited.”

Nor is the second condition fulfilled. When the misunderstanding was corrected by the CPS, a second request was issued and was adjudicated upon on its merits before the Judge in just the same way as it would have been if issued immediately after conviction for the absconding offence. The failure to issue the second request earlier has caused no prejudice or unfairness to Mr Badie. That is all the more so now that he has been discharged in respect of the second request as a result of the wording of the Extradition Order.

Accordingly this ground of appeal fails.