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ECJ: European Court of Justice judgment: Italy told it cannot send a person to prison because they are unable to remove them from the country

01 April 2011

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ECJ: European Court of Justice judgment: Italy told it cannot send a person to prison because they are unable to remove them from the country: The Directive on the return of illegal immigrants precludes national rules imposing a prison term on an illegally staying third-country national who does not comply with an order to leave the national territory (Press release, pdf) and Full-text of judgment (pdf):

"Mr El Dridi, a third-country national, entered Italy illegally. In 2004 a deportation decree was issued against him, on the basis of which an order to leave the national territory within five days was issued in 2010. The reasons given for that order were that he had no identification documents, no means of transport were available and it was not possible for him to be accommodated temporarily at a detention centre as no places were available. As he did not comply with that order, Mr El Dridi was sentenced by the District Court, Trento (Italy) to one year’s imprisonment...

The Court considers therefore that the Member States may not, in order to remedy the failure of coercive measures adopted in order to effect a forced removal, provide for a custodial sentence, such as that provided for by the national legislation at issue in the main proceedings, on the sole ground that a third-country national continues to stay illegally on the territory of a Member State after an order to leave the national territory was notified to him and the period granted in that order has expired."

See also: Italy wants to continue deportations despite EU ruling (EUbusiness, link): Note that the judgment does not as such limit deportations, but only limits detention.

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