Ex-con's detention pending removal to home country ruled illegal

A former inmate, whose immigration status was revoked whilst in prison has been released after a court ruled that his subsequent arrest was illegal.

The court ruled that a removal order alone is not sufficient to detain persons for the purposes of the immigration act.

Inspector Darren Buhagiar had told the court, presided by magistrate Rachel Montebello, that Aleksander Stojanovic had just served a prison sentence and was released from prison earlier this month. He was sent to the Immigration Section, which issued an order of return for Stojanovic, but which failed to also issue a removal order.

Stojanovic was kept in police custody until his return to his homeland could be arranged.

His lawyers, Jason Grima and Gianluca Cappitta had subsequently filed habeas corpus proceedings, attacking the man’s arrest as illegal, after he was released from prison.

An order of return is not the same as a removal order and both had to be present in order for the man to be transported out of the country, he argued.

The court, after examining the relevant law, agreed, saying that “it was the removal order and the order of return together and not the order of return alone which authorises the detention of a person [for the purposes of the immigration act].”

It ordered Stojanovic’s immediate release from arrest.

It also ordered a copy of the ruling together with the acts of the case be sent to the AG by the next working day.