Posted on 06/01/2006 6:17:55 PM PDT by blam
Warrant will give EU judges power over British police
By David Rennie in Brussels
(Filed: 02/06/2006)
The Government signed up to a European Evidence Warrant yesterday that gives foreign judges the power to send British police into a British home and seize evidence in connection with suspected crimes committed in other European Union nations.
The new warrant is founded on the principle of "mutual recognition", meaning that British authorities have only the most slender, technical of reasons to object to a warrant, and in most cases must execute them automatically, as if they were issued by a British court.
The warrant was agreed by the Attorney-General
British and EU officials hastened to present the new warrant as an important tool in the fight against terrorism and organised crime. It was agreed in Luxembourg by the Attorney-General, Lord Goldsmith.
Under the new warrant, a Spanish judge investigating a rape on the Costa del Sol would have the power to send police to a tourist's home in Britain to search for a specific item of clothing.
The warrant cannot be used to order a search for new evidence, ruling out the prospect of British police being sent on "fishing expeditions" for evidence that might support a case under investigation. Communications data, such as e-mails and telephone records, and DNA samples are explicitly excluded from the scope of the warrant.
A British official said: "This isn't about the British police kicking your door down on the whim of a foreign judge. These are warrants for serious crimes and, just like British warrants, there has to be a solid case behind them."
When it comes to issuing the new warrant no special safeguards are planned in the event of Romania and Bulgaria entering the EU next January, as is currently planned.
It will take more than two years for the new evidence warrant law to be transposed into the national laws of each EU nation but once it is on British statute books a Bulgarian judge will have the power to issue warrants.
That is despite the most recent European Commission report on Bulgaria's readiness to join the EU, which said the Balkan nation had to do much more to fight endemic corruption in the judiciary and criminal justice system, and stated that organised crime "puts into question the rule of law in Bulgaria".
Friso Roscam-Abbing, the commission's justice and home affairs spokesman, said that intensive efforts were under way to reform the Bulgarian and Romanian court services.
All criminal offences can be used to justify the issuing of a warrant by another EU nation, not just terrorism, murder or other serious offences. In cases of relatively minor crimes, British police can refuse to carry out a raid if the offence in question does not exist in British law.
This thing just gets worse and worse. I wish the Brits would reject the EU outright.
The US has a similar agreement with Mexico. A couple of years ago, there were several hundred Mexican prisoners in US jails who were picked up by Mexican authorities under warrents requested in the US. And vice versa. It keeps criminals from claiming Kings-X by just crossing a border.
Yes, but they are starting to make our Articles of Confederation look really good, by comparison!
Yes it is.
LOL! Yes it does.
another step toward one world socialism.
the end of western civilization is at hand.
What's done is that LE in one country gets a warrant from that country's court and passes it (through some formalities) to a court in the other country (which has to approve the warrant). Then the second country's LE's can make the arrest. Else we would have the Mexican (and French, and English, and Nigerian,...) police operating in the US. This way, local LE does the work.
Does this EU abomination by pass one of the courts?
As I read it, it does. I'm not sure. Mostly, one has to run things by a magistrate in the target country. Of course, that makes Argentina a good place to hide under these rules.
Unsaid, but implied, is that Britain has the identical power to do the same in reverse. It is not a one way street.
Although I can't understand why any country would agree to that...
I would rather embrace the alternative, sending in 'hit teams'...
This could, technically, be used to harass another EU country. Britain's LE could be jumping all over the country delivering junk warrants. The whole EU concept stinks. Any organization that demands punishment for members who want to leave it isn't worth having in the first place.
Let's check this out with MadIvan. Maybe this isn't so.
"the end of western civilization is at hand."
More like a return to Western Civilization circa 150 AD, when one government, Rome ruled most of Europe's population, as well as North Africa and the Levant.
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