Model in Brexit bid to avoid extradition
A MALE model facing international money-laundering charges should not be extradited to the North due to Brexit, the High Court heard yesterday.
Mark Adams, 40 is alleged to have been in possession of €180,000 in two brown envelopes when stopped at Belfast International Airport on May 9, 2018. At the time, he was attempting to get a flight to Spain.
Northern Irish authorities want him extradition on charges that he concealed the cash in his hand luggage, and tried to remove it from the North on that date, knowing or suspecting the money to be proceeds of crime.
Mr Adams, of Castleheath, Malahide, Co. Dublin, is also facing prosecution for allegedly entering into an arrangement, namely the attempted removal of criminal property from Northern Ireland, and knowing or suspecting that this arrangement would facilitate the retention, use or control of such criminal property, by persons unknown, between May 13, 2013, and May 10, 2018.
An application for an extradition order to be granted and postponed was made yesterday in the High Court. Counsel for Mr Adams, Paul Comiskey O’Keeffe BL, told the court that his client faces trial on June 21 next year for four domestic charges in this jurisdiction for money laundering.
Mr Comiskey O’Keeffe said that in the event of him being convicted and sentenced in this jurisdiction, a potential trial in Northern Ireland could be an infringement of his rights to a fair trial due to the withdrawal agreement of the UK from the European Union.
Mr Comiskey O’Keeffe said that depending on what happens next, if the court makes an order for extradition, Mr Adams could be put in a territory outside the EU.
Judge Paul Burns noted that people are extradited to the US and other places. He added that it was an ‘interesting and novel’ case and that there may be more of them.
Mr Adams was remanded in custody to appear in court again on July 16.