Everyone wants to believe in the continuation of a quality relationship, but judicial cooperation between the United Kingdom and France on the one hand, and with the European Union on the other hand, will experience some practical adjustments and complications. after Brexit. “The common security issues between the two countries, for example on the subject of organized crime or trafficking in human beings, have not disappeared with the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union”, says one at the French embassy in London.
The mechanisms for mutual recognition of court decisions or investigative acts shaped over the years by EU member countries have no longer been automatic since 1er January. One of the first consequences is the end of London’s participation in the European arrest warrant (EAW) which, since 2002, has been one of the major advances towards the creation of a European judicial area.
Guarantee fluidity
This extremely effective device has replaced the endless and random extradition procedures still subject to a political green light. When it comes to the execution of a prison sentence or of arrest in the context of an investigation, the EAW goes from judicial authority to judicial authority with mutual recognition of decisions without political intervention.
The December 24 Brexit agreement between London and Brussels plans to replace it with a new ad hoc tool, inspired by existing agreements between the EU and Norway or Iceland. An operational committee must adjust, by February 28, the terms of this mechanism for handing over people, which will remain entirely under judicial control, and establish a new common form to ensure its fluidity.
But each country may oppose the surrender of its own nationals. London has already made it known that it will not exclude its nationals from the system. Unlike France which, according to our information, should announce soon that it will no longer hand over its nationals to British justice, thus approaching the extradition regime. Good year, bad year, the French magistrates ask the British justice to hand them between 60 and 90 people. In practice, less than half were returned to France, the judges being, across the Channel, very picky about the nature of the charges in each case.
Adapt instruments
Certain procedures, marginal in volume, will nevertheless no longer be able to succeed due to the principle of double criminality which resurfaces with Brexit. A requested arrest can now only be honored if the offense concerned exists in the penal code of both countries. This is of course the case for crimes, scams and other trafficking but, for example, the offense of “abandonment of the family”, punishable in France by two years’ imprisonment and a fine of 15,000 euros for one person. which no longer pays alimony, does not exist across the Channel.
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