The High Court has continued an order restraining the removal from Ireland of a Romanian man who returned here eight months after he was deported.
The 39-year-old man has been granted leave to seek, by way of judicial review, an order quashing the deportation order made by the Minister for Justice, dated May 11th, 2000. He is also challenging the constitutionality of part of the Immigration Act 1999.
In an affidavit, the man said he arrived in Ireland on the first occasion in June 1996 and sought asylum. In January 2000 his solicitor was informed that the Minister proposed making a deportation order and submissions were made as to why he should not be deported.
The man said he received no further correspondence from the Minister or his then solicitors. He now understood an order for his deportation was made but sent to an address at South Circular Road, Dublin. He first became aware of the order in June 2000 when arrested without warning in Dame Street, Dublin. He was held overnight in prison and put on a plane to Romania the following morning. He was not served with the deportation order.
The man claimed he had formed attachments in Ireland during his four-year stay and the Minister had failed to have proper regard to those attachments, his social relationships, his employment capacity and his character and personal conduct.
On February 23rd, the High Court granted the man an interim injunction preventing his removal from the State until after yesterday's hearing before Mr Justice Finnegan. Yesterday, the judge continued the restraining order for another three weeks. Mr Robert Barron, for the State, said the man had spent six or seven months in Romania and did not appear to have been persecuted.