Updated | Extradition proceedings for Maltese man wanted in Lithuania hit unexpected obstacle

Magistrate Aaron Bugeja will continue hearing submissions in the extradition proceedings relating to Angelo Spiteri tomorrow afternoon, after his defence team invoked a provision of European law which had never been used in Malta before.

Spiteri's hopes of avoiding extradition to Lithuania, where he is wanted on face fraud charges, looked slim this afternoon with the court upholding three out of four of the grounds submitted by the Attorney General arguing for his extradition to Lithuania.

But that all changed this evening during submissions by defence lawyer Jason Azzopardi, who invoked article 5(3) of the very legal instrument which established the European Arrest Warrant -the unwieldily-named "Council Framework Decision of 13 June 2002 on the European arrest warrant and the surrender procedures between Member States."

That particular legal provision reads that where a person, who is the subject of a European arrest warrant for the purposes of prosecution is a national or resident of the executing Member State (in this case Malta), his or her surrender may be made subject to the condition that he or she, is returned to the executing Member State in order to serve the custodial sentence handed to him in the issuing Member State (Lithuania).

Spiteri is the subject of a European Arrest Warrant in Lithuania, where he along with two others, is accused of setting up “Atostogu sandèlis” (which loosely translates to Holiday Warehouse) in Vilnius – a false company which would convince its victims to sign accommodation agreements with certain hotels and after signing and receiving payment for this, would deliberately not provide the service which he had received payment for.

Amongst other charges, Spiteri is also accused of conspiracy to commit fraud, using the cover of a legal entity to perform illegal activities, swindling, organising the manufacture of unlawful documents and forgery of company financial documents. The Lithuanian authorities claim that he absconded from the country in February this year, during the pre-trial investigations.

During his submissions, Azzopardi pointed to reports by the Council of Europe which had condemned the Lithuanian prison system, comparing its conditions to those of the former USSR. To support this argument, the lawyer also quoted a 2013 decision by the Irish supreme court, which had blocked the extradition of Real IRA member Liam Campbell to Lithuania to face weapon smuggling charges. The Irish court had refused the extradition request on the grounds that this would expose him to a “real risk of inhuman and degrading treatment by reason of the jail conditions.”

After scrutinising the legal notice transposing this piece of EU legislation into local law, magistrate Bugeja said that there was no article which reflected article 5 of the framework decision.

The hearing was adjourned and will resume tomorrow afternoon for the Attorney General's office to present its counter arguments.