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What on earth has the Law Society got to do with policing and crime matters? And have they asked those of their practising members who deal with European Arrest Warrants for their opinion?

I personally think it's a disgrace how the EAW works in practice.

You can have a guy born in Poland, who has been living in, say, Morpeth for 10 years, married, kids here, kids go to school here, can be arrested in a dawn raid at 5:00a. He's dragged down 308 miles and over six hours by road (not including rest stops) to Westminster Magistrates Court, and held in custody pending extradition for not having paid a mobile phone bill 15 years ago.

This could happen simply on the say so of a Polish prosecutor certifying that under under Polish law the actions constitute fraud, and that the Polish authorities - even though they knew he wasn't in Poland - still prosecuted him and sentenced him to six years in prison in abesentia.

And whereas most other EU countries with any sense would promptly file such a request in the cabinet marked "mañana, domani, morgen or tomorrow", our jobsworth zealots spring into action and have no compunction against this sort of nonsense.

I have also heard that Poland has some sort of law which says that every crime no matter how petty or old has to be investigated and prosecuted, leading to hundreds of EAWs issued against Polish nationals living in England for so-called offences years and years ago.

And when it does get to court, under the "Framework", the English court has to assume that all is good, that it is a serious offence (because the requesting state says so), and that it is in the interests of justice to send someone across the continent simply because it has been requested. The powers of the courts to refuse extradition are extremely limited.

So on what basis has the Law Society decided that this is a good idea?

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