extradition lawyer wins at Higher Regional Court Oldenburg / Germany, absence judgment from Italy, extradition was averted

Higher Regional Court Oldenburg, Court's Order of 09. 02. 2016 - 1 Ausl 76/15 - inadmissibility of extradition of a Dutchman to Italy based on EAW issued by the Regional Court Bolzano

German extradition lawyer Dr. Martin Rademacher had to deal with an Italian absence judgment and was successful in achieving the client`s release from extradition prison in Germany, where he was being held under the authority of the Oldenburg Higher Regional Court.

The extradition request from the Italian prosecution based on the issuance of a European arrest warrant after our client was convicted in his absence to a custodial sentence of 6 years for importing and possessing cocaine in 2007 by the Court in Bolzano, Italy. In December 2015 the Dutchman was arrested during a business trip to Germany based on this European arrest warrant. As a consequence of our intervention the extradition was able to be averted and he was released from prison in Germany in February 2016 and sent back to the Netherlands.

Dr. Rademacher effected this result by filing an application to this end with the Higher Regional Court in Oldenburg. After intensive legal argument he was able to convince the Court to decree the extradition as inadmissible (ruling dated 09.02.2016 – 1 Ausl 76/15) despite the European arrest warrant. The Higher Regional Court established the inadmissibility of the extradition to Italy because the European arrest warrant was based on an absence judgment and the Italian prosecutor was not able to provide evidence that the defendant had been duly summoned.

By the way: In the meantime on September 6, 2016 the Court of Justice of the European Union decided in the „Petruhin-case“, 1. that a Member State is not required to grant every Union citizen the same protection against extradition as that granted to its own nationals. But 2. the Court of Justice of the European Union pointed out, that before extraditing the citizen, the Member State concerned must give priority to the exchange of information with the Member State of origin and allow that Member State to request the citizen’s surrender for the purposes of prosecution.

We often use the term “extradition“ while the English-language version of the Framework Decision on the European arrest warrant uses the term “surrender”. But even in most German extradition-judgements you find the term „Auslieferung“ which is the translation of the word extradition. In most cases the term “extradition” is used.