Trayan Beshkov

On 21 September 2017, the Court of Justice (Fifth Chamber) delivered its judgment in case C-171/16, on Council Framework Decision 2008/675/JHA of 24 July 2008 on taking account of convictions in the Member States of the European Union in the course of new criminal proceedings, which the Court is called upon to interpret for the first time.

In 2010, Mr. Beshkov, a Bulgarian national, was convicted by an Austrian court for an offence committed in Austria and sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 18 months, six months being served and 12 months being suspended, with a probation period of three years. In 2013, he was convicted by a Bulgarian court for different facts committed in Bulgaria and was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of one year. This sentence was however not enforced, as his whereabouts were not known to the Bulgarian authorities. In 2015, Mr. Beshkov requested the referring court, for the purposes of the enforcement of that sentence, the imposition upon him of a single total custodial sentence corresponding to the highest of the penalties imposed by the Austrian and Bulgarian courts, in accordance with Articles 23(1) and 25(1) of the Bulgarian Code of Criminal Code. In so far as one of the penalties was imposed by a foreign court, the referring court is unsure whether it must first recognize the decision of the Austrian court or whether, on the basis of Framework Decision 2008/675, it can or even must grant Mr. Beshkov’s request. It therefore seeks guidance from the Court on the interpretation of this Framework Decision, in particular on the concept of “new criminal proceedings” within the meaning of its Article 3.

In light on the wording of Framework Decision 2008/675, the Court first held that this Framework Decision is applicable not only to proceedings concerned with establishing that an accused person is or is not guilty of an offence, but also to proceedings relating to the enforcement of the sentence where account must be taken of a sentence imposed following a previous conviction handed down in another Member State.

The Court therefore found that Framework Decision 2008/675 is applicable to a national procedure that is concerned with the imposition, for the purposes of execution, of an overall custodial sentence that takes into account the sentence imposed on that person by a national court and also that imposed following a previous conviction handed down by a court of another Member State against the same person for different facts.

The Court then turned to the question of whether Framework Decision 2008/675 must be interpreted as precluding the possibility that it should be a prerequisite of account being taken, in a Member State, of a previous conviction handed down by a court of another Member State, that a national procedure for prior recognition of that conviction by the courts with jurisdiction in the former Member State, such as that laid down in, in particular, Articles 463 to 466 of the Code of Criminal Procedure at issue in the main proceedings, be implemented.

In this respect, the Court recalled that the aim of Framework Decision 2008/675 is to implement the principle of mutual recognition of judgments and judicial decisions in criminal matters, which precludes the possibility that it should be a prerequisite of account being taken of a previous conviction handed down by a court of another Member State, that a national procedure for prior recognition be implemented, and the possibility of that previous conviction being, in that procedure, reviewed.

The Court therefore found that Framework Decision 2008/675 must be interpreted as precluding the possibility that it should be a prerequisite of account being taken, in a Member State, of a previous conviction handed down by a court of another Member State that a national procedure for prior recognition of that conviction by the courts with jurisdiction in the former Member State, such as that laid down in Articles 463 to 466 of the Code of Criminal Procedure at issue in the main proceedings, be implemented.

The Court finally addressed the question of whether a national court, seised of an application for the imposition, for the purposes of execution, of an overall custodial sentence that takes into account, inter alia, the sentence imposed following a previous conviction handed down by a court of another Member State, may alter for that purpose the arrangements for enforcement of that latter sentence.

In light of the wording of Framework Decision 2008/675, the Court stressed that taking into account previous convictions handed down in another Member State is not to have the effect of interfering with, or revoking, previous convictions handed down by the courts of other Member States. Nor it has the objective to bring about the execution, in a Member State, of judicial decisions taken in other Member States.

It thus follows, according to the Court, that a national court cannot, pursuant to Framework Decision 2008/675, review and alter the arrangements for execution of previous convictions handed down in another Member State that have been previously executed, in particular by revoking a suspension attached to the sentence imposed on that conviction and converting that sentence to a period of imprisonment. Nor can a national court order, in that context, further execution of that sentence as thus altered.