AC-2023-LON-001921 - [2025] EWHC 1416 (Admin)

The hearing in A was on 6 December 2022. The requested person relied on statements from a first French lawyer (M Thibaut Kempf) dated 25 July 2022 and a second French lawyer (M Etienne Arnaud) filed on 2 December 2022: see A at §§9, 18. The IJA’s position was that the French court had exclusive competence to consider whether to make a deduction for Qualifying Curfew and it was not open to the UK extradition court to consider whether – by reference to Qualifying Curfew under the French Code – the requested person had “served his sentence” (§§21, 23, 40). That argument failed (at §40). Reference was made in A (at §19iv and vi) to a case at Westminster Magistrates Court called France v Miller. In Miller the requested person had relied on a report of a French lawyer (M Philippe Pejoine) dated 5 February 2020 (A at §19vi). Reference was made to the French Supreme Court’s judgment of 17 March 2021 (A at §§11 and 32). The hearing in Doga was on 3 October 2023 and the requested person relied on a report from the French lawyer (M Arnaud) dated 4 July 2023 (Doga §9). There was no “reasoned opposition to M Arnaud’s evidence” (Doga §33). In the present appeal, the Appellant relied on A and Doga and the substantive content of the materials discussed in those judgments.

The substantive hearing was fixed on 4 December 2024, for 8 April 2025. The Respondent’s skeleton argument (31 March 2025) included the submission that the appeal could not succeed without case-specific expert evidence. On 1 April 2025 the Respondent filed and served two documents discussed in A and Doga (§17 below). On 2 April 2025 the Appellant filed an application to adduce fresh evidence, accompanied by a 3-page legal opinion of a French lawyer (Marie D’Harcourt). On 3 April 2025 the CPS (Darren Watts) emailed the Court and the Appellant’s representatives recording that the Respondent was “neutral” as to that application. My pre-reading day was 7 April 2025. The hearing commenced at 1030 on 8 April 2025.

At the start of the substantive hearing (8 April 2025) Mr Swain told the Court that the Respondent had now decided, late the previous afternoon, that it wished to have an opportunity to file a written response to Mme D’Harcourt’s legal opinion. Mr Swain’s primary application was for an adjournment, with a fresh date to be fixed. I dismissed that application. I took the view that it had come far too late. I was not prepared to lose the allocation of court time, which had been provided to the parties for oral submissions in the case. I said I would defer consideration of whether to allow a period to file a written response, to which the Appellant could reply. I then heard all the arguments on the issues and materials.

Having heard the arguments, I decided to allow the Respondent four weeks (to 6 May 2025) for a response to Mme D’Harcourt’s legal opinion; and two weeks (to 20 May 2025) for the Appellant to reply. I said I would then consider, in light of any accompanying submissions, whether to reconvene for any further oral argument. I was conscious that both parties could have filed case-specific evidence at earlier stages. Although Ms Grudzinska’s primary submission was that the appeal should succeed even without Mme D’Harcourt’s evidence, the facts were that Mme D’Harcourt’s evidence was being relied on (albeit in the alternative) and it had come very late in the day. It would be unfair to shut out any response, notwithstanding the lateness of the Respondent’s request. I was satisfied that the deferral and directions were necessary in the interests of justice and the public interest.