Request for a preliminary ruling from the Audiencia Nacional (Spain) lodged on 26 July 2023 – Criminal proceedings against JMTB
(Case C-481/23, Sangas) 1
Language of the case: Spanish
Referring court
Audiencia Nacional
Criminal proceedings against:
JMTB
Other parties: Ministerio Fiscal; Abogacia del Estado
Questions referred
Since Article 4(6) of the Council Framework Decision of 13 June 2002 on the European arrest warrant and the surrender procedures between Member States (2002/584/JHA) 1 provides that the grounds for optional non-execution of the European arrest warrant include cases in which the European arrest warrant has been issued for the purposes of execution of a custodial sentence or detention order, where the requested person is staying in, or is a national or a resident of the executing Member State and that State undertakes to execute the sentence or detention order in accordance with its domestic law:
a) Is it permissible to extend the application of that optional ground for refusal to surrender to cases in which a final decision has not yet been reached regarding the requested person?
b) If that possibility were allowed, is it possible to refuse to surrender on the ground that the requested person is resident in the State in which enforcement is sought, without that State undertaking to execute the sentence or detention order in accordance with its domestic law?
Since Article 4(4) of Council Framework Decision of 13 June 2002 on the European arrest warrant and the surrender procedures between Member States (2002/584/JHA) provides that the grounds for optional non-execution of the European arrest warrant include cases where the criminal prosecution or punishment of the requested person is statute-barred according to the law of the executing Member State and the acts fall within the jurisdiction of that Member State under its own criminal law, is it permissible to extend that ground for optional non-execution of the European arrest warrant to cases in which the offence or penalty is regarded as statute-barred under the law of the executing Member State, even if the courts of that State do not have jurisdiction to determine the facts?
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1 The name of the present case is a fictitious name. It does not correspond to the real name of any party to the proceedings.
1 OJ 2002 L 190, p.1.