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	England and Wales High Court (Administrative Court) Decisions
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales High Court (Administrative Court) Decisions >> Voci v Government of the Republic of Albania [2014] EWHC 4030 (Admin) (16 October 2014) URL: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2014/4030.html Cite as: [2014] EWHC 4030 (Admin)

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IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
DIVISIONAL COURT

		Royal Courts of Justice Strand London WC2A 2LL
		16th October 2014

1. MR JUSTICE CRANSTON:

Introduction

2. This is an appeal against the decision of District Judge Evans in the Westminster Magistrates' Court in August 2013, to send the appellant's case to the Secretary of State under section 87(3) of the Extradition Act 2003 ("the 2003 Act"). The government of the Republic of Albania had sought the extradition of the appellant to serve a sentence of life imprisonment for an offence of murder. The District Judge rejected the appellant's arguments that his extradition should be barred on a number grounds. Some of these have been abandoned as grounds of appeal in the light of the decision of this court in Bardoshi Sadushi v Albania [2014] EWHC 2756 (Admin). That test case also explains the delay in the hearing of this case, delay which will become apparent in a moment.
3. Before us the grounds of appeal are that the District Judge was in error deciding (i) the appellant was not a target of an active blood feud and (ii) there were no sufficient grounds for believing that he would face a real risk of ill treatment or death in prison in Albania.

The extradition request

4. The background is this. The Albanian request of 18th October 2012 from the General Prosecutors Office states that in February 1997 the appellant was employed as a storekeeper for the Albanian Intelligence Agency, the National Informative Service ("SHIK"). On 10th February he was travelling in a Mercedes van driven by somebody else. At approximately 3.30 pm they encountered the victim, Astrid Cela, who was travelling in an Audi in the direction of Tiriana. The driver of the Mercedes forced the victim's Audi to move to a ditch at the edge of the road by improperly overtaking another vehicle. The victim turned his car around and followed the Mercedes until it stopped near a village, Tapia. As he passed the Mercedes the victim complained but the driver gestured in an insulting way.
5. After both vehicles stopped the victim alighted his vehicle carrying a pistol with the muzzle down and approached the Mercedes, identifying himself as a police officer. As the drivers were talking the appellant got out of the Mercedes with an automatic sub-machine gun, which he held legally as part of his job, and shot the victim causing his immediate death.
6. The appellant's account is that he saw that both drivers made indecent gestures at each other but that the victim waved a pistol before both vehicles stopped and when he got out of the car the victim had his pistol in an outstretched arm. At the time he told the police he shot in the air and then at the victim's direction. His account now is that when he got out of the Mercedes he shot in the air as did his colleagues. The victim fell to the ground.
7. The Albanian request adds that when police arrived at the scene he helped them to take the victim to the car and set off with him to Tiriana to take him to a military hospital. After that he returned home and told his wife that he had murdered someone.
8. The appellant was arrested and kept in custody. On 24th February 1997 he was charged with murder. The driver of the Mercedes was apparently also charged with murder. It was a time when there was a breakdown of civil order in Albania: in the first weeks of March 1997 prison guards in Albanian prisons left their posts because they had not been paid and opened the cell doors. Thus the appellant left prison on 13th March 1997.
9. The following year, when civil order had been restored, the Albanian court directed the police to search for the appellant but he could not be found and was declared an escapee. On 23rd March 2000 the appellant was tried in his absence, convicted of murder by the District Court in Kruje and sentenced on 6th December 2000 to life imprisonment. He was represented at his trial by a lawyer appointed by the court. The appellate court in Tiriana rejected an appeal lodged by his court-appointed lawyer.

Evidence before District Judge

10. In September 2011 the appellant arrived in this country in the back of a lorry. He claimed asylum in October 2012. At that point he was arrested because of the Albanian request for extradition, to which I have referred. After at least one adjournment there was a substantive hearing on 8th July 2013. At that hearing the appellant gave evidence. The evidence he gave was largely consistent with the account he gave in his asylum interview, although the latter was more elaborate regarding his being beaten up on remand in prison in Albania in 1997. In his asylum interview he said the beatings were as the result of a blood feud. In his reserved judgment the District Judge rejected the appellant's arguments and sent the case to the Secretary of State. She ordered his extradition on 23rd October 2013.
11. Before the District Judge the appellant's account was that he had been forced to flee Albania, not to avoid trial but because he was scared that friends and relatives of the victim would seek him out and kill him. He had learned from a friend of his father who attended the victim's funeral that a red scarf had been tied to the victim's head. This was a symbolic signal of initiation of a blood feud. There had been an attack on the Kruje police station on the night of the shooting and he believed that was part of the blood feud. The prosecution had told him there was a blood feud. In his account the victim's family were well connected.
12. His account before the District Judge was that he escaped to Greece and his family followed. He lived there for over a decade. While in Greece, in February 2008, he had been shot in the left leg and he asserted that the shooting related to the blood feud. Before the District Judge there was evidence of Dr Arnold who had examined the appellant in May 2013 and concluded that scarring of the appellant's body was consistent with a gunshot wound.
13. The appellant's account was that he had separated from his wife about that time and they were later divorced. He told the District Judge that he then returned to Albania for 3 years on the basis that that was the last place where he might be expected to be. During that time he lived in a remote village. In his evidence there had been three attempts to murder his brother. All related to the blood feud. The brother had migrated to Canada and had subsequently died there from natural causes.
14. For the hearing before the District Judge the appellant's solicitors commissioned two reports on blood feuds in Albania. The first was by Dr James Korovilas who has taught at the University of Tiriana during visits over a number of years. He opines that the circumstances in which the appellant was responsible for the unprovoked death of a victim is entirely consistent with the tradition of a blood feud in Albania. The victim's well connected family would seek to avenge the victim's death in order to restore his honour. The attack in Greece, said Dr Korovilas, was consistent with the not uncommon fact that Albanian blood feuds spill across the border into neighbouring Greece. That the appellant had been convicted of killing the victim would be of little significance to the victim's family especially since he has so far managed to escape justice. In his view the appellant would be extremely vulnerable to a revenge attack should he be in an Albanian prison, given the level of corruption in the Albanian prison system.
15. The second report was from Antonia Young, who was working as an anthropologist in the Balkans for 50 years and has written widely on the area. She has worked with blood feud mediators and visited families involved in feuds. On a recent visit she found that the situation worse than she understood previously. Although blood feuds are not condoned by the Albanian authorities, her evidence was that the police and other institutions are ineffective in protecting vulnerable individuals. Families in a feud can only survive by living "closed" lives, since living within the home counts as a sanctuary. Blood feud murders have been brought to court, she acknowledged, but given lenient sentences. When murderers are in prison the victim's family does not recognise this as proper justice.
16. In response to an argument that a blood feud target is safer in prison, she opined that it can depend on the influence that avenging family have on prison staff. It is not unknown, she says, for blood feud killings to take place inside prisons. In prison it could not be certain that the appellant would be free from a revenge attack.
17. Also before the District Judge was further information provided by the Albanian Ministry of Justice dated 20th February 2013. The Ministry of Justice stated that many blood feud defences are raised by persons facing extradition are bogus. When they are not bogus there are adequate safeguards to protect persons in prison from being attacked. The Minister of Justice suggested that the problem of blood feud killings is a declining phenomenon and gives statistics in support. In the additional information the Ministry of Justice also stated that murder due to blood feuds is dealt with as murder and that the criminal code provides that as an aggravating circumstance it may lead to a heavier sentence. He also explained that blood feud threats are criminalised. The addition information assured continuous protection to the appellant if his life were jeopardised. Moreover, the Minister stated that the framework for prison offers protection for those who are vulnerable and the government is currently in the process of introducing electronic monitoring to prevent violent and the maltreatment of prisoners.

The District Judge's decision

18. In his judgment the District Judge accepted that it was entirely possible that there was no blood feud and that the appellant was just a fugitive from justice. Neither expert had addressed their minds to the possibility that this was an elaborate account invented for asylum and extradition purposes. That the appellant's account was consistent with what one would expect if there were a blood feud did nothing to assist in any determination as to whether a blood feud exists. The appellant was an educated man and while on the run had plenty of time to hone a convincing tale. The killing for which he was sought was the sort of incident which might initiate a blood feud but it would not inevitably do so. The expert evidence singularly failed to deal with that point. The District Judge noted there was no independent evidence that supported the existence of a blood feud. At paragraph 29 he said he could not rule out the possibility that there exists an active blood feud in the case but he was not satisfied on the balance of probabilities in respect of all the evidence produced in the case that there was or is a blood feud.
19. In the course of his judgment the District Judge referred to the decision of the Upper Tribunal Immigration Asylum Chamber in EH (blood feuds) Albania CG [2012] UKUT 00348 and to the factors identified there relating to blood feuds. While recognising that that case arose in the context of an asylum claim the District Judge stated that he had considered the check list in reaching his decision. In my view he was entitled to, indeed he was well advised to do so.
20. At paragraph 27 of his reasons the District Judge referred to the assurances given by the Albanian Minister of Justice, while acknowledging that they would not necessarily satisfy the court.
21. As for the Article 3 challenge in relation prison conditions the District Judge said that was premised on the appellant being subject to an act of blood feud. He was not satisfied that the appellant was the target of any active blood feud. Even if he were a target there was insufficient evidence to establish substantial grounds for believing he would be at a real risk of suffering of ill treatment as a consequence of it in prison.

The Appeal

22. On behalf of the appellant Ms Hill submitted, first, that the District Judge was in error in reaching the factual conclusion that the appellant is not a target of an active blood feud. The available evidence regarding the existence of a blood feud which was placed before him was sufficient to establish that the appellant was the target of a blood feud. She criticised the the test that the District Judge had invoked at paragraph 29 of his decision and submitted that his conclusions could not be upheld.
23. In Ms Hill's submission there was support for the evidence given by the appellant. In particular, there was the evidence of Dr Korovilas and Antonia Young. In considering that evidence the District Judge had placed a too high a burden of proof on the appellant. He appeared to expect that the experts were testifying to a level of certainty which was unrealistic and untenable. We should reach our own conclusions on the matter. Specifically she referred to the evidence that blood feuds persist in Albania today notwithstanding the letter from the Ministry of Justice. The Albanian authorities fail to protect the individuals subject to them. The appellant had demonstrated that he was the subject of an ongoing and serious feud. The 2008 shooting in Greece was corroborated by the medical evidence of Dr Arnold.
24. Although attractively and cogently put, these were bold submissions which in my view get nowhere. The fundamental problem for the appellant is that the District Judge was not persuaded by his account of a blood feud. Ms Hill identified what she said was an error at paragraph 29 of the District Judge's judgment and invoked the passage in Bagdanavicius v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2005] UKHL 38, [2005] 2 AC 668, at paragraph 18, where in giving the judgment of the Appellate Committee Lord Brown referred to the test being that the appellant had to show substantial grounds for believing that he would face a real risk of being subject to treatment contrary to Article 3. In my view, however the District Judge put the matter at paragraph 29 the fact is that he was not satisfied that there was the real risk. That runs as a thread through his reasons. Whatever was said at one particular point cannot undermine his very clear conclusion that the appellant had not persuaded him that there was a blood feud. There is no suggestion that the ordinary rules governing appeals from findings such as these of the District Judge are different in the context of extradition hearings. It was clearly open to the District Judge to reject the appellant's account in relation to this and other matters.
25. Even if there was a real risk the other aspect in this type of case are the particular steps taken by the State, in our case Albania, to protect against that risk, a point which Lord Brown underlined at paragraph 13 of Bagdanavicius. The District Judge realistically stated that the court will not regard assurances by a requesting state as watertight. Nonetheless they are a factor which must be taken into account, as he did in the circumstances of this case.
26. As regards the expert evidence the District Judge was entitled to find that it did not provide support for the appellant's account. There is no dispute that blood feuds exist in Albania but the issue which the District Judge was faced with was whether this appellant's account should be accepted that he was subject to one. The District Judge said that the expert's evidence corroborated the appellant's account of a blood feud but, correctly, that neither addressed the possibility that there was no blood feud and that the appellant's account did not hold water. A murder might trigger a blood feud but the experts had not addressed the issue that it would not inevitably do so and, in particular, had not done so in this case. In my view, the District Judge's approach on that issue cannot be faulted.
27. Regarding Dr Arnold's report about the appellant's scarring, the District Judge was entitled to conclude, as he did, that it was not sufficient corroboration of the appellant's account that the victim's family had followed him to Greece. As the District Judge observed, the wounds could well be explained in other ways.
28. For the reasons given by the District Judge I cannot accept that the appellant has made out that he faces a real risk of Article 2 and 3 ECHR mistreatment because of the blood feud.
29. Ms Hill's second ground is that the District Judge was in error about Albanian prison conditions and the cumulative threat to the appellant, in particular because of the blood feud. In her written submissions she referred to a number of reports, which go to material conditions and treatment in Albanian prisons. In her submission the appellant's position would be more acute because of the inadequate monitoring of human rights in Albania and the pervasive corruption in Albanian prisons. In the case of the appellant, she submitted, the impact of detention would be exacerbated by the legitimate fear that he would be under threat from non- State actors while detained.
30. There is no doubt those reports paint a grim picture of life in Albanian prisons. The issue for the District Judge was whether those conditions posed a real risk that the appellant would be subject to inhuman and degrading treatment. None of the reports referred to by Ms Hill suggested that they do. Moreover, in the appellant's case the Albanian authorities have stated that the appellant will not be held in those conditions and that he will be offered continuous protection if his life is jeopardised. Vulnerable prisoners, we are told, are treated in accordance with accepted European standards. Those assurances are given against the background that Albania is a signatory to the Convention and so benefits from the presumption that it will comply with its obligations under it.
31. As to any threat the appellant faced in prison Ms Young, in her expert report, certainly referred to the blood feud killings taking place inside prison. But that was not backed by reference to specific examples. Even if it be accepted that such deaths may occur, it was open to the District Judge to place weight on the assurances of the Albanian Minister that protections are in place to avoid the risk with a person in the appellant's position.
32. The District Judge considered Albanian prison conditions and their ramifications for the appellant. He rejected the appellant's case. Nothing before us leads me to believe that he was wrong to conclude that the appellant did not establish a real risk of breach of Article 2 and 3 of the Convention due to Albanian prison conditions. As with the first ground of appeal, I would adopt his approach as my own.
33. For these reasons I would dismiss this appeal.
34. LORD JUSTICE BEATSON: I agree.