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

There is clear evidence from the respondent judicial authority that no period beyond the six months served in custody would fall to be deducted… This case is therefore quite different from A v France …, where the respondent judicial authority had said nothing about whether the appellant had served his sentence. Here, the respondent judicial authority has said something very clear about that: he has not. Does Dr Kádár’s evidence enable me to reach a contrary view? The terms of his evidence suggest a negative answer. Dr Kádár himself considers that “not all types of criminal supervision are deducted from the sentence to be served” and that the situation is “not clear cut”. Although he describes one case in which the court was persuaded to take into account time served on an equivalent curfew, he properly adds that he cannot say whether this case “can be regarded as standard practice” and expresses a particular doubt about whether the procedural device used in the one case of which he is aware would be available here. The evidence is not sufficiently clear to enable me to reach a finding about Hungarian law that is directly contrary to the express view of the Hungarian judicial authority.