Polish chef fights extradition decision

Tuesday 05 February 2019

A Polish chef has appeared in the Royal Court to fight a decision to extradite him to his home country in connection with an offence he committed over a decade ago when he was just a teenager.

Dariusz Burdynski (32) launched his appeal against the decision made by the Attorney General yesterday.

The case centres on Mr Burdynski’s conviction for stealing two cars when he was 17 years old in Poland for which he was sentenced to 18 months in jail, with a two-year suspended sentence. 

Despite having served the full prison sentence, upon his release Mr Burdynski left Poland without informing his Probation Officer and was therefore found to be in breach of a probation order. As a result, the two-year prison sentence which was initially suspended was activated at a hearing which Mr Burdynski did not attend due to not being in Poland at the time. 

Pictured: Dariusz Burdynski's appeal came to the Royal Court yesterday as the Polish national continues to fight the extradition request.

Polish authorities requested that the Jersey-based chef leave his home of nearly a decade to return to jail in his native country – a request that both Assistant Magistrate Peter Harris and the Attorney General Robert MacRae have signed off.

The case comes as part of a recent spate of requests from the Republic amid growing concerns about the ruling right-wing Law and Justice party's 'crackdown' approach to criminal justice in Poland.

However, Mr Burdynski and his lawyer Advocate Jeremy Garrood are now fighting this decision, having launched an official appeal against the Attorney General himself.

Mr Burdynski’s case has been subject to a series of lengthy and technical hearings in the Magistrate’s Court and now, with this appeal, it has progressed to Jersey’s Royal Court where it is being heard by Royal Court Commissioner Julian Clyde-Smith and Jurats Blampied and Ramsden. 

Pictured: Advocate Jeremy Garrood has launched an appeal against the extradition request on behalf of his client after a series of lengthy hearings in the Magistrate's Court.

This comes over six months after Mr Burdynski was arrested during an early-hours raid of his home last summer.

In summary, Advocate Garrood’s arguments to prove his client’s grounds for appeal were: 

• the original offences themselves are not “serious” enough to qualify as extradition offences under the law;
• the Assistant Magistrate did not follow all the criteria set out in the extradition law when deciding whether Jersey could consent to extradition;
• the fact that his client was not present at the hearing where the suspended sentence was activated is problematic;
• the original extradition request came from the Polish Court rather than the Minister for Justice, rendering it null and void under the law.

Advocate Garrood also referred to a lack of evidence provided by the Republic of Poland during the original extradition hearing, arguing that there are several areas where they “failed” to make the case justifying his client’s extradition.

Advocate Matthew Maletroit, appearing on behalf of the Republic of Poland, responded to Advocate Garrood’s case for an appeal as he began his submissions in favour of extraditing Mr Burdynski.

Pictured: Mr Burdynski's case forms part of a recent spate of extradition requests from the Republic of Poland.

Regarding the argument that the offences are not serious enough to warrant an extradition, Advocate Maletroit explained that, to determine the seriousness of the crimes, the only criteria the Court need apply is the maximum sentence such offences could receive if committed in Jersey. 

Advocate Maletroit contended that, according to the law, as the offences could receive a sentence of up to 12 months’ imprisonment from the Jersey Courts, they were serious enough to warrant an extradition request, urging the Commissioner and the Jurats that “delving into an assessment of penalties” is not their task.

The appeal case continues.