The Claimant was represented by Helen Foot of Garden Court Chambers, led by Ben Cooper KC, with Amelia Nice of Doughty Street Chambers.
Helen Foot was instructed by Guy Mitchell at Hodge, Jones & Allen.
The High Court upheld a judicial review by a vulnerable autistic man accused of cyber-crime, establishing new defence rights within the Extradition Act 2003, in a victory for natural justice.
In R (Coelho) v Secretary of State for the Home Department, the Administrative Court (Linden J) allowed the Claimant’s judicial review of a decision of the Secretary of State for the Home Department (SSHD) to defer his extradition to Portugal in favour of extradition to the USA.
The Claimant, Diogo Santos Coelho (known online as “Omni”), a 25-year-old Portuguese citizen, is accused of controlling and administering a website known as RaidForums, a Clearnet hacking forum distributing data breaches facilitating fraud. The Claimant is an accepted victim of modern slavery.
The Home Office recognised he was groomed by adults online when he was a child and coerced into setting up Raidforums. He is autistic and has been assessed by psychiatrists as at extremely high risk of suicide if extradited to the USA.
The Claimant is subject to competing extradition requests from the USA and Portugal. On 14 March 2024, the SSHD made a decision under s179(2) of the Extradition Act 2003 to defer his extradition to Portugal until a request for his extradition to the USA has been disposed of. The Claimant has consented to extradition to Portugal but has an ongoing appeal against his extradition to the USA.
The Claimant issued a claim for judicial review against the SSHD’s decision under s179(2), on grounds that the decision was (1) procedurally unfair, since the SSHD did not consider any information or representations from him or the Portuguese authorities relevant to the statutory test; (2) based on material errors of fact; and (3) failed to take into account material considerations.
The Court allowed the claim on grounds 1 and 2 and in part on ground 3.
On Ground 1, Linden J rejected the Minister’s case that the scheme of the 2003 Act excluded the common law duty to afford the Claimant an opportunity to make representations addressing the differential impact of extradition to the USA, compared to Portugal, and here to consider: the Claimant’s proximity to family and friends in his home country; his connection with the Portuguese legal systems; his rights and likely outcomes in the criminal process; his rights to support in relation to his mental health as a victim of modern slavery, his autism diagnosis; and his risk of suicide in the US federal custody.
The court found that the Clamant ought to have been given an opportunity to make representations [116]-[118]. The opportunity for the USA and Portugal to make representations is also conducive to better informed decision making by the SSHD [119].
On Ground 2, Linden J found that the SSHD was wrongly advised that offences charged in the US request and the Portuguese warrant were “identical”, whereas the Portuguese warrant included wider conduct including money laundering and tax fraud. In addition, the decision was based on the incorrect premise that all the victims of offending were in the USA, whereas a key victim was the Portuguese state [145]-[147].
As to Ground 3, Linden J found that the SSHD irrationally failed to take into account the greater seriousness of the Claimant’s alleged offending in Portugal, his personal interests and ties to Portugal and his mental health [163]-[169].
Mr Coelho’s case has been reported in the national and international press, including in The Guardian, The Mirror, and BBC News.
Link to full judgment (BAILII): Coelho, R (On the Application Of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2025] EWHC 2293 (Admin)
