The European Arrest Warrant Procedural Assessment Tool (EAW-PAT) was developed as part of the EAW AWARE Project, funded by the European Commission’s Justice Action Grant Programme. Over 30 months, judges, public prosecutors, lawyers, academics and prison service officials regularly came together to exchange understanding on how conditions of detention in issuing member states affect the execution of EAWs.

The aim of this tool is to allow EAW-executing judicial authorities to easier cross-reference information they need to know about prison conditions with the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime detention compliance checklist for national officials. The UNODC Checklist supports the assessment of compliance with the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (The Nelson Mandela Rules) and is targeted at national officials who are tasked with undertaking internal or administrative inspections.

The aim of the supporting text in this document is to briefly outline what humane conditions of detention are in Europe in practice, and to centralize useful European information sources and contact points. Used together, this text and the EAW-PAT aims to help the executing judicial authority to first identify an area of potential concern in conditions of detention in the issuing state, then to know what existing sources of information or contacts can help them find out more.

Download The European Arrest Warrant Procedural Assessment Tool (EAW-PAT)