Unfair Albanian Supreme Court Process and Unjustified Delays Give Rise to Flagrant Article 6 Breach
Joel Smith KC and Louisa Collins successfully appeal against extradition to Albania on Article 6 grounds, instructed by Renata Pinter of Dalton Holmes Gray.
The Divisional Court (Popplewell LJ and Saini J presiding) handed down judgment on 2nd July 2025: Zeqaj v Albania [2025] EWHC 1670 (Admin).
The case concerned an alleged double murder which took place some 27 years ago in circumstances where the only evidence linking the appellant to the offence came from witnesses who were family members of the deceased and who were now either dead, very old or had been a child at the time of the offence. The appellant had been convicted in his absence in 2002, then extradited in 2013 whereupon he was retried and acquitted. The acquittal was upheld by the Albanian Court of Appeal and he returned to his home in the UK. A prosecution-led appeal to the Supreme Court resulted in the acquittal being overturned and a further retrial ordered. The Albanian authorities, despite knowing how to contact the appellant and his nominated lawyer, failed to notify him of the appeal. Indeed, the first time he became aware of the overturned acquittal was in 2017 when the second retrial proceedings began. All five of the presiding Supreme Court judges who ordered the retrial have since been dismissed from office due to breach of duty or corruption.
The Court found that the Albanian Supreme Court proceedings were fundamentally unfair: “It is hard to conceive of a more significant breach than preventing the Appellant from participating in, or being represented by a lawyer of his choice, at such an important stage of the proceedings.” [§57(1)]. Further, the dismissal of the entire panel of Supreme Court judges showed that they cannot have been an Article 6 compliant tribunal. In addition, the “extraordinary” length of the proceedings had been compounded by the delay in the retrial, which was still ongoing at the time of this extradition appeal, some 8 years after it had started. The Court found that this gave rise to “a clear breach of the reasonable time requirement.” .
The findings, whilst referable to the specific circumstances of the case, demonstrate that the Courts are willing to intervene and prevent extradition where it can be shown that there is a denial of fair justice in the requesting state.
BAILII report here