AC-2025-LON-001576 - [2025] EWHC 2592 (Admin)

The factual background.

Much of the factual background is not in dispute; I have highlighted any issues of controversy below.

The Claimant is an Irish national, currently detained by the Defendant at HMP Lowdham Grange.

On 4 May 2020, the Claimant, who was 32 at the time, was sentenced to 5 years and 4 months’ imprisonment for robbery, with shorter concurrent sentences for other offences including further robberies and burglary. All the offences had been committed on 13 January 2020. This was his first experience of imprisonment within the UK prison system, or its system of release on licence; it has also been explained to the Court that there is no equivalent system of supervision following release in Ireland.

According to the copy of the draft or unsigned licence in the bundle, the Claimant’s sentence was to have expired on 16 May 2025 (a date derived from his sentence length, less time already served on remand). The Claimant’s period of custody was to end on 15 September 2022; this was his Conditional Release Date, being the half-way point of his determinate sentence.

Again according to the documentary evidence before the Court (and as explained in the witness statements of Ms Shuttlewood) shortly before that date, on 26 August 2022, a Prison Offender Manager, as well as the Claimant’s Community Offender Manager from the Probation Service, spoke to the Claimant by ‘phone. On the previous day (according to notes on the Defendant’s case management system), the Claimant had been told that he was “no longer being extradited” and that a telephone conference call had been arranged with his Community Offender Manager “regarding his release, sentence plan and any loose ends”. So the context of the telephone discussion was a plan to release the Claimant from custody in the UK.

The file note of the telephone conversation demonstrates that there was a general discussion of licence conditions (including conditions to be imposed to address drugs and alcohol use) with the Claimant. The officers attending “Went through licence conditions and reporting instructions.” On this topic, the Claimant’s witness evidence is that there “… is said to be a note of a telephone conversation between myself and a Probation Officer called Yasmin King and a prison offender manager called Danny Worster. I cannot remember this event. I cannot recall any of the conversation recorded there.” He did not think that any meetings with Probation Service officers took place, but notes that it was a very confusing time, with some incorrect information being given to him at the time (e.g. that he was not to be extradited to Ireland). When he was extradited, he thought that he would have no responsibilities or relationship with the English Probation Service, and he was never shown a licence. The Claimant’s lack of recollection of the conversation on 26 August 2022 is not, of course, a denial that it took place and I accept the accuracy of the file note.

On 14 September 2022, the Claimant was transferred to HMP Wandsworth under an extradition warrant issued by the Westminster Magistrates’ Court on 9 September 2022; he was wanted by the Irish authorities in connection with an allegation of violent disorder in Limerick in December 2019. He was therefore not automatically released from custody on his Conditional Release Date, as the Defendant’s witness statement notes.

It is the Defendant’s case that on 15 September 2022, the Claimant’s licence nevertheless came into effect and was effective until the point of extradition (28 September). There is a copy of the licence relied on by the Defendant in the Bundle. It has not been signed or dated by either the Defendant’s representatives or by the Claimant and there is no evidence that it was ever shown to the Claimant before his extradition to Ireland, or that any discussion of the licence system in the UK took place after the conversation on 26 August 2022. The licence contained standard conditions, including:

5(i): to “Be of good behaviour and not behave in a way which undermines the purpose of the licence period”,

5(ii): “Not to commit any offence”;

5(iii): to “Keep in touch with the supervising officer in accordance with instructions given by the supervising officer”, and

5(vii) “Not to travel outside the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man except with the prior permission of the supervising officer or for the purposes of immigration deportation or removal”.

Condition 3 also required the Claimant upon release to “report without delay” to the Duty Officer at Enfield Probation Office.

On 28 September 2022, the Claimant was extradited to Ireland to face various charges which resulted in convictions for two counts of assault (for which he was sentenced to 1 year consecutive, and 18 months suspended and concurrent); and violent disorder (6 months concurrent) and no insurance (5 months imprisonment). The effect of s59(2) of the Extradition Act 2003 is that the time remaining on his UK sentence was ‘paused’ on extradition, thus extending the Sentence Expiry Date. Furthermore, under s59(6)(a), if a “person [is] released on licence at the time of extradition”, his licence is “suspended until the person’s return”. Whether or not the Claimant was “a person released on licence” at the material time of extradition is disputed by the Claimant and I return to this issue below, but the Defendant says that this is what had occurred and took decisions on that basis.

Prior to or during early January 2023, the Claimant was released from prison in the Republic of Ireland. In early January 2023, unknown to the Defendant at the time, the Claimant re-entered the UK. The Defendant’s case is that he automatically became subject to his licence conditions on his entry to the UK.

On 8 January 2023, the Claimant was arrested for being drunk and disorderly. According to his evidence, he was released without charge and returned to Ireland the next day. However, charges were brought, since by 23 February 2023 the Claimant was due to attend the Manchester City Magistrates’ Court to answer allegations of being drunk and disorderly in a public place. The offence is non-imprisonable but may be punishable by a fine. He did not attend, but the offence was withdrawn. It is now apparent that the reason it was withdrawn was because the Court considered that “the Defendant has been extradited.” This appears from a document from the Manchester City Magistrates’ Court which was supplied to the Defendant on 6 August 2025, in the course of gathering and clarifying the evidence in this application for judicial review (see the second statement of Ms Shuttlewood, which exhibits it; the same information was, however, provided in a report from the Greater Manchester Police to the Parole Board in 2024).

On 9 June 2023, the Claimant pleaded guilty in the Limerick Circuit Court to an offence of violent disorder committed on 8 February 2023, and was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment (effective from 7 March 2023). On 27 July 2023, he pleaded guilty to a further offence of violent disorder. The following day, a sentence of two years and six months’ imprisonment was imposed, with the final 18 months to be suspended. He was however released from prison in Ireland by early 2024, on temporary release conditions.

Returning to events in February 2023 in the UK, on 14 February 2023 and then again on 23 February, the Probation Service was notified that the Claimant was due to appear in the Manchester City Magistrates’ Court. This led to consideration of whether the licence should be revoked. Key internal emails from the Probation Service include:

On 23 March 2023:

“I have requested the information regarding his extradition.

However, it appears that he is clearly back in the UK. Extradition is not deportation so we do not terminate the case in these instances. He needs to be managed /the event stay live until LED [Licence Expiry Date]. If you have no means to contact him / re-engage him then you would be looking at recall.

I’ll get back to you when I get confirmation of what he was extradited for. It would seem though that either he served the sentence in Ireland or was found not guilty …”

I pause to say that the reference to extradition and deportation reflects the fact that, prior to receiving notice of the Claimant’s return to the UK, there had been some confusion about the terms of his removal from the UK in 2022, with a belief that he had been deported (which would meant that the licence should be terminated). At the email above shows, this misunderstanding was corrected on 23 March 2023.

Emails on 23 March continued:

“I presume I will need to recall this man….

Information for Shirley [Head of Service, Enfield & Haringey Probation]

Extradited from prison on day of release to Ireland.

No communication since then regarding a return to the UK.

I was contacted by a court in Manchester on 23/3 when he was appearing for a drunk and disorderly charge - they thought he was on [Post-Sentence Supervision] and the charges were not proceeded with, he should have been recalled at that point.

I followed up to ascertain if he was in the country / confirmed extradition and it has taken until the [email set out above] to understand how to manage the case.

Recall based on risk being unmanageable / no contact with probation.”

On that day, a request to authorise recall was made to the Head of Service, Enfield and Haringey, and immediately approved.

The following day, the Probation Service submitted a recall request to the Defendant’s Public Protection Casework Section (“PPCS”). Ms Shuttlewood explains in her first statement, para 10, that “Once the Probation Service has initiated the process by making a recommendation for recall in a Part A report,PPCS, on behalf of the Defendant, reviews the information in the Part A report and decides whether there are sufficient grounds to recall the offender to custody and the type of recall appropriate.” On 24 March 2023, the Part A was received by PPCS and reviewed by a Case Manager. The same day, PPCS took the decision, on behalf of the Defendant, to revoke the Claimant’s licence, meaning that he again became liable to be detained in prison to continue serving his determinate sentence. This is the first decision under challenge.

The ‘Secretary of State’s Reasons for Licence Revocation’ states:

“You have been recalled to prison because the Secretary of State is satisfied you have breached the following condition of your licence:

i.  be of good behaviour and not behave in a way which undermines the purpose of the licence period;

5.iii.  keep in touch with the supervising officer in accordance with instructions given by the supervising officer.

In view of the offences for which you were originally sentenced, the risk suggested

by your offending history and your behaviour as described in the recall report

completed by the Probation Service, and which is attached, the Secretary of State

revokes your licence and recalls you to prison.”

The Part A Recall Report had referred to breaches of conditions 5(i), 5(ii) and (iii), an inability to contact the Claimant and his being unmanageable in the community (Boxes 17(a) and 19). As for the Claimant’s offending history, at the time he had 25 convictions for 92 offences in the UK and the Republic of Ireland spanning from 2005 to 2022.

As set out above, the Claimant had by July 2023 been convicted of further offences in Ireland and was serving a sentence of imprisonment there. On 8 February 2024, the Claimant was approved for temporary release by the authorities in the Republic of Ireland, on conditions which (according to the information before the Parole Board in October 2024) were subsequently breached, meaning that he was regarded as being unlawfully at large.

The Claimant returned to the UK on 6 March 2024. He was arrested on that date by the police, and returned to prison pursuant to the Defendant’s decision to recall him.

At this stage, the Claimant did not make representations to the Defendant about the circumstances of his recall. Instead, his case was automatically referred to the Parole Board by the Defendant. The Parole Board considered the circumstances of his recall and continuing detention in a hearing held on 31 October 2024. By a decision issued on 9 December 2024, it declined to order the Claimant’s release from detention. It did, however, consider the circumstances of the Claimant’s recall to prison at length, to decide whether that decision had been “appropriate” (it was not charged with assessing whether or not it had been lawful, which is a matter for this Court). On the basis of the evidence heard and put before it, the Board accepted that the Claimant had never been informed that he was on supervision, or what being on licence meant, before being extradited from the UK in September 2022. “It is of great concern that probation records have no contact with or regarding Mr Quilligan prior to or after his extradition to ROI”. It heard from the Claimant on the circumstances of his arrest in January 2023 and concluded that the case must have been “evidentially weak” as it was not proceeded with and there was nothing to contradict the “exculpatory” account of events which the Claimant gave. The Board found that he was not in breach of any licence conditions, when the decision to recall was made by the Defendant. Nor could it have been reasonably concluded that there was a breach, or that recall was necessary. As a result, the decision to recall was not appropriate. However, having regard to the risk posed by the Claimant (specifically, after his Sentence Expiry Date in April 2026, when he would no longer be subject to conditions and supervision on licence) his risk of harm would not be manageable in the community, and the Board did not direct his release from prison.

In a letter dated 16 January 2025, the Claimant’s legal representatives asked the Defendant to rescind the recall and to release the Claimant, given the Parole Board’s findings on the decision to recall. In a short email by way of response sent on 17 February 2025, the stance that the “recall is appropriate” was maintained and the Defendant declined to rescind the decision. This is the second decision under challenge.

Thereafter, this application for judicial review was brought.

According to the second statement from Ms Shuttlewood, the Claimant’s Sentence and Licence Expiry Date is now calculated to be 31 July 2026. (It was said to be 28 April 2026 in the Parole Board papers but the difference is not material in these proceedings).