INTERNATIONAL DEFENCEEuropean Arrest Warrant and extradition defence in Spain

What is at stake

• Detention and appearance before the Audiencia Nacional within 72 hours
• Remand in custody in many cases while surrender is decided
• Surrender within days if you consent; a contested procedure if you do not
• Serving the sentence abroad, far from your family
• With third countries, a two-stage judicial and governmental procedure

What we do

• Opposition to surrender and application for provisional release at the first hearing
• Grounds for refusal: ne bis in idem, limitation, trial in absentia, humanitarian grounds, risk of treatment contrary to Article 3 ECHR
• Residents and nationals: request that any sentence be served in Spain
• Challenge to defective or disproportionate warrants and Interpol notices
• Coordination with lawyers in the issuing country to attack the warrant at source

Act 23/2014 · The Spanish EAW framework

Spain implements the Framework Decision on the EAW through Act 23/2014 on mutual recognition. It sets out the mandatory and optional grounds for refusing surrender and the procedural timetable that the Audiencia Nacional must follow.

Article 51 of Act 23/2014 · The hearing

After arrest you are brought before the court. If you do not consent to surrender, a hearing is held with the prosecutor and your defence: identity, grounds for refusal, and your personal situation are argued there. This is not a formality: it is the hearing where the case is usually won or lost.

Mandatory and optional grounds for refusal

Surrender must be refused for amnesty, ne bis in idem or where the person is below the age of criminal responsibility in Spain, and may be refused where the offence is time-barred under Spanish law, where the requested person is a Spanish national or resident and undertakes to serve the sentence in Spain, or where the judgment was given in absentia without proper guarantees.

Article 3 ECHR and detention conditions

Where there is a real risk of inhuman or degrading treatment, including because of prison overcrowding in the issuing State, Spanish courts must request assurances and may refuse surrender. Recent European case law (Aranyosi and its progeny) has made this a serious, evidence-based defence rather than a theoretical one.

Act 4/1985 · Extradition to non-EU States

Extradition proper follows the bilateral treaty and Act 4/1985: a judicial phase before the Audiencia Nacional and a final governmental decision. Double criminality, political offences, and the risk of unfair trial or ill-treatment are the core defences, and the timescale is measured in months.

Interpol red notices

A red notice is a police alert, not a judicial decision. Where it is abusive, politically motivated or based on a debt dressed up as fraud, it can be challenged before Interpol’s Commission for the Control of Files (CCF) and deleted. We run that procedure in parallel with the Spanish case.