Rahman v County Court of Boulogne Sur Mer, France

MR JUSTICE BLAKE:

This is an appeal by Farzal Rahman against the decision of District Judge Zani sitting in the City of Westminster Magistrates' Court on 15 July 2014 when he ordered the appellant's return to France pursuant to a European Arrest Warrant.

The appellant is a British citizen born in High Wycombe in the United Kingdom in April 1985. It seems that his parents originally came from Pakistan but have lived in High Wycombe for a substantial period of time. He has six siblings also living in that area. In about January 2007 he married his wife, Farmiz Bibi, who had been brought up in Pakistan and came to the United Kingdom following marriage around May 2007. In October 2008 she gave birth to a daughter, M, and in October 2010 she gave birth to another daughter, Z. Z has various serious health difficulties from birth and the appellant has been active in her complex care.

The appellant is wanted by the French judicial authorities for offences of tax fraud and failure to make tax returns and to keep proper accounting documents. The European Arrest Warrant issued in September 2013 identifies that he was the manager of a business called EURL Delta Beers and Wines established in Coquelles, Calais, near the entrance to the Channel Tunnel, and that between October 2007 and February 2008 he failed to pay tax and keep proper accounting records, with the result that VAT was not paid and the sum owing is said to be 4.25 million euros.

Criminal proceedings in respect of that conduct were started in October 2009 when the Director of the Tax Division of the Pas de Calais Departement made a complaint. It is not entirely clear from the information before the court what happened between October 2009 and November 2011. There is a reference in the warrant to a request for judicial assistance from the UK authorities but the appellant was not apparently located. It is unclear why any such request would have been unsuccessful given the continuity of his residence at an address in High Wycombe and the fact that the appellant's whereabouts are likely to have been known to the police in the United Kingdom for reasons which I will turn to later in this judgment. At some point between those two dates it was decided that his case should be tried in his absence and a decision must also have been taken not to issue an accusation warrant that might have brought him back to France in time to face his criminal trial.

On 15 November 2011, the appellant was convicted in his absence by the criminal court of Boulogne Sur Mer and sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment and a fine of 25,000 euros. It is common ground that as the appellant was never arrested or summonsed for these offences and has never been investigated for them or served with any process he is not a fugitive from justice and would be entitled upon his return pursuant to this warrant to demand that his conviction be set aside, although undoubtedly he would be treated as a convicted person and held in custody unless and until such a retrial was sought. He disputes that he is the person who committed these offences. He states that he has never been to France save for 3 days as a tourist in 2006; has no knowledge of the beer and wine company concerned with these offences and that he has never been the manager of any such company.

When he was arrested late in 2013 pursuant to the European Arrest Warrant he told the police officer that in 2006 he had lost a passport and he suggests that he is the victim of an identity theft but such limited inquiries as have been made of the French authorities do not reveal what evidence there is to link him to this crime. The European Arrest Warrant issued in September 2013 correctly identifies his name, nationality, date of birth, place of birth and identifies his place of residence in High Wycombe, giving the postcode, which is the address of his parents. In the evidence that he submitted to the District Judge, he and his wife both state that when they first married and she came to the United Kingdom they lived with his parents at that address. His parents still live there, as do some of his younger siblings. He states he and his wife moved out of that address in around about 2011 for a couple of years and moved to 33 Chiltern Avenue in High Wycombe. But in September 2013, according to the medical records at least, they moved to a third address that is the same road and very close by his parents' address. It also appears that in July 2008 he was summonsed for various offences of driving without a licence and related traffic matters, for which he was fined, which appear upon his criminal record. That also suggests that information and an address would have been available to the British police if an accusation warrant had been issued that was necessary to serve upon the appellant.

The court does not know what information had to be supplied to the French authorities in connection with setting up a company or running a business as a manager, though it is not wholly improbable that some information about addresses and nationality would have been required. It is also the case that no action appears to have been taken between November 2011, the date of the conviction, until September 2013, when the conviction European Arrest Warrant was issued, despite the fact it must have been known that the appellant was a British national and had not been found to be residing in France.

Before Judge Zani the appellant resisted extradition to France on grounds that included, one, oppression due to delay; two, disproportionate interference with his family life, particularly having regard to the child Z's reliance on his care and the detrimental effect on her of his removal to France for a period of up to 18 months; a third ground canvassed in the hearing below, that the conduct was not sufficiently set out in the warrant, is not renewed.

With that summary of the relevant factual background, I first turn to consider the question of delay. Section 14 of the Extradition Act 2003 reads as follows:

"A person’s extradition to a category 1 territory is barred by reason of the passage of time if (and only if) it appears that it would be unjust or oppressive to extradite him by reason of the passage of time since he is alleged to have—

(a)committed the extradition offence (where he is accused of its commission), or

(b)become unlawfully at large (where he is alleged to have been convicted of it)."

It should be noted that this wording is identical to the terms of section 82 of the Act that deals with extradition to Part 2 territories. It will thus be seen that extradition is barred where it is considered unjust or oppressive by reason of the passage of time but the periods of time for calculating delay are different, apparently, depending on whether it is an accusation warrant or a conviction warrant. In a case where a person has become unlawfully at large, it is only delay from that time onwards that counts. Whereas, in an accusation warrant it is delay since the commission of the offence.

The present warrant is, of course, a conviction warrant founded upon an in absentia conviction in 2011, albeit that it is common ground that as he is not a fugitive the conviction can be set aside on his demand and he has had no notice of the proceedings. At first blush it would be bizarre, and indeed unfair, if an accused person in these circumstances is restricted in the duration of the delay upon which he can rely in resisting his return by reason of the happenstance of a conviction of which he knows nothing until he is arrested on the European Arrest Warrant and from which he cannot in any sense be said to be a fugitive from justice.

This problem has been twice considered by judges sitting in this court in recent years, so far as the researches of counsel have discovered. In the case of Campbell v Public Prosecutor of the Grande Instance Tribunal of St-Malo, France [2013] EWHC 1288 (Admin), Keith J was considering the case of a conviction EAW issued in October 2012 for a 2009 conviction for a 2005 offence. There had in the history of the proceedings been an earlier accusation warrant issued in 2009 that was ineffective because it was not certified at the time. At paragraph 25 of his judgment Keith J, having recited the statutory provisions inclined to the view that the appellant could not rely on delay since 2005 because he faced a conviction warrant, but he nevertheless examined whether the delay from 2005 would have been oppressive for the purpose of section 14 in order to decide whether it was now an abuse of process to insist upon his return, the period of delay in that case by the time of the case was 7 years. He concluded that it was an abuse of process.

In the case of Cousins v The Public Prosecution of the Grande Instance Tribunal of Boulogne Sur Mer, France [2014] EWHC 2324 (Admin), a judgment given on 2 July 2014, the circumstances and the criminal conduct was very similar to the present offence. The appellant was accused of failing to make accounting entries for a business in Calais between September 2008 and May 2009 as a result of which 700,000 euros in VAT were evaded. The appellant apparently was questioned about these matters pursuant to a judicial assistance request in November 2009 but thereafter nothing happened and there was no request for her return to face trial but a criminal prosecution was instituted in July 2011 leading to an in absentia conviction in July 2013 and a European Arrest Warrant issued shortly thereafter.

It is apparent from paragraph 10 of the judgment that counsel then appearing for the appellant submitted to Ouseley J that he could not rely upon section 14 because it was a conviction warrant. It seems that counsel for the respondent did not disagree with that contention. Reference was also made to Keith J's solution of looking at it as an abuse of process argument. The judgment continued in these terms:

"12. The upshot is that the provisions of section 14 could never apply, or apply to the full extent, that might be expected in view of the fact that the appellant would be entitled to a retrial, where the requesting authority has never told the requested person of the trial. It is undoubtedly a curiosity, and more than that it is a matter of some concern, which Mr Newton [appearing for the appellant] presses, that a requesting judicial authority can seek to proceed with a trial, securing in absentia a conviction, and then prevent section 14 being argued. Even if it is not a deliberate ploy it nonetheless as a consequence may be unfair. In my judgment it would be an unfair and prejudicial outcome if there is no other means whereby the section 14 factors can be given full reign. It may be that the authorities which deal with the point at which someone is to be regarded as accused as opposed to convicted, in particular under section 14, merit some further examination where there is an entitlement to a retrial if a person is extradited."

Counsel for the appellant nevertheless persuaded Ouseley J in that case was that the delay could be considered under Article 8, to which issue the judgment then turns. Ouseley J said this at paragraph 14:

"Although I have some reservations about the way in which Article 8 and proportionality could be used as some kind of kitchen sink for all aspects of extradition that cannot properly be considered under other headings, I propose to deal with the matter on the basis that there would be no injustice to Mrs Cousins through consideration of injustice and oppression to the full extent, using the Article 8 framework."

In the event he concluded that Article 8 would not be violated on the particular facts of that case.

In his skeleton argument in support of this appeal, Mr Lloyd who appears today for the appellant, invited me to adopt either the approach of Keith J and look at the full period of delay if only for an abuse argument and/or the approach of Ouseley J, which is to examine it through the Article 8 construction. I accept, of course, that there is some degree of overlap between oppressive delay for section 14 purposes and delay in the context of the Article 8 point but equally I share Ouseley J's reservation about simply proceeding down this route as a catch-all where the central point that the appellant wants to make is the change of circumstances caused by the passage of time since the offence was first committed.

In my judgment, it is not necessary to deal with the question of prejudicial delay in this case by characterising it either as an abuse or solely by reason of Article 8. I invited counsel to assist on the language of section 14 itself, where I inclined to the view that it is ‘being unlawfully at large’ is the relevant event that starts the passage of time and accordingly the reference to ‘being convicted’ is a reference to a conviction which is final because the appellant has had notice of it and he has evaded participation in that judgment as that is the only type of conviction that would make a person unlawfully at large within the ordinary meaning of that term.

When I raised the matter with Mr Sternberg, who appears for the respondent today, he drew to my attention the insertion in 2006 of section 68A into the Extradition Act 2003. It is headed "Unlawfully At Large". It reads as follows:

"(1)A person is alleged to be unlawfully at large after conviction of an offence if—

(a)he is alleged to have been convicted of it, and

(b)his extradition is sought for the purpose of his being sentenced for the offence or of his serving a sentence of imprisonment or another form of detention imposed in respect of the offence.

(2)This section applies for the purposes of this Part, other than sections 14 and 63."

(emphasis supplied)

This suggests that for the purposes of section 14, and section 63, the ordinary meaning of unlawfully at large is to apply. Indeed, any other meaning would render the words of the section absurd if an in absentia conviction which is not the responsibility or fault of the appellant could prevent him, essentially, pleading delay at all. Mr Sternberg conceded that cannot have been Parliament's intention. One of the canons of statutory construction is to avoid consequences that are absurd if it is possible to do so.

I have been referred to no decision binding upon me that precludes that the construction that I would be inclined to draw simply from analysis of the words. There is an authority which is binding on me which supports that construction. Gomes v Trinidad and Tobago [2009] UKHL 21 [2009] 1 WLR 1038 was a case concerned with a classic fugitive from justice and section 82 of the Extradition Act 2003. The decision is principally notable for applying the dictum of Lord Diplock in Kakis v Government of Cyprus [1978] 1 WLR 779 to the problem of whether a fugitive from justice can essentially rely on any delay that arises from his own flight from the scene. At paragraph 30 of the judgment of the court given by Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, it is acknowledged that section 82(b) is dealing by definition with people who are unlawfully at large and therefore subject to Lord Diplock's rule. But towards the end of the judgment, at paragraph 38, the following is said:

"The final question discussed before the House was the period of time for consideration under s.82. It starts, of course, with the date of the alleged offence (s.82(a)) or when the fugitive became unlawfully at large (s.82(b)) (a fugitive tried in his absence without having deliberately absented himself from his trial falling for this purpose under s.82(a))."

The judgment then goes on without development of that point but it seems to me that that is at least a judicial statement of opinion that where a person is not unlawfully at large, even though he may have been the subject of an in absentia conviction, the case should be dealt with under section 82(a) in a Part 2 territory, which would correspond to section 14(1)(a) of the present statute.

An echo of a similar approach, though not primarily concerned with the meaning of the statute, can be found in a decision of the then President of the Queen's Bench Division, Sir John Thomas in the case of Federal Public Prosecutor, Brussels, Belgium v Bartlett [2012] EWHC 2480 (Admin). That was a case of a person who had faced an accusation warrant that was not proceeded with and then faced a conviction warrant based upon an in absentia conviction of which he had no knowledge, having not been summonsed for it. At paragraph 31(vii) the following was said by the President:

"Mr Bartlett is in no ordinary sense of the word a convicted person. He may formally have been convicted, but his conviction was consequent upon a procedure under which on any objective basis it was unfair to convict him. No court could therefore regard him as a convicted person."

Fortified by these authorities I reach the conclusion that in effect a person remains accused of a crime for the purposes of the oppression limb of section 14 unless or until there has been a conviction from which he was required to participate from which he has absconded himself and is therefore a fugitive from justice. Such an approach avoids having to shoehorn the present problem either into abuse of process questions, where there is a more rigorous test and a requirement generally of absence of good faith or simply leaving it to a factor in the Article 8 balance.

I will now consider whether the delay since October 2007 and February 2008, when the offence was alleged to have been committed, until either the date of the issue of the European Arrest Warrant and its service in late 2013 or the continuing delay pending the resistance to extradition is oppressive. The classic definition of what oppression is was given by Lord Diplock long ago in the case of Kakis, to which reference has already been made. He said as follows at page 782:

"'Unjust' I regard as directed primarily to the risk of prejudice to the accused in the conduct of the trial itself, 'oppressive' as directed to hardship to the accused resulting from change in his circumstances that have occurred during the period to be taken into consideration; but there is room for overlapping, and between them they would cover all cases where to return him would not be fair. Delay in the commencement or conduct of extradition proceedings which is brought about by the accused himself by fleeing the country, concealing his whereabouts or evading arrest cannot, in my view, be relied upon as a ground for holding it to be either unjust or oppressive to return him. Any difficulties that he may encounter in the conduct of his defence in consequence of the delay due to such causes are of his own choice and making. Save in the most exceptional circumstances it would be neither unjust nor oppressive that he should be required to accept them.

As respects delay which is not brought about by the acts of the accused himself, however, the question of where responsibility lies for the delay is not generally relevant. What matters is not so much the cause of such delay as its effect; or, rather, the effects of those events which would not have happened before the trial of the accused if it had taken place with ordinary promptitude. So where the application for discharge ... is based upon the 'passage of time' ... and not on absence of good faith... , the court is not normally concerned with what could be an invidious task of considering whether mere inaction of the requisitioning government or its prosecuting authorities which resulted in delay was blameworthy or otherwise."

The period of delay in this case, some five and a half to six and a half years, is substantial, although the court is familiar with much more extensive delays, particularly in cases where the person is a fugitive from justice. By comparison, it will be noted that in Campbell there was a relevant delay of seven years and through the route that he adopted Keith J thought that extradition was an abuse of process. In Cousins it was four and a half years and Ouseley J did not consider that return was disproportionate to the family life of the appellant in that case. Applying the Kakis approach, what has changed since February 2008 in the light of this appellant is the birth of two children to him and his wife and his establishment of himself in High Wycombe as a family man with responsibilities. He has had continuous employment, presently working as a pizza delivery man, and it is certainly the case that since the birth of his second daughter in October 2010 he has taken a very active role in her development and growing up; today, in fact, is her 4th birthday. I have noted already a conviction in July 2008 for an offence of driving without a licence and there was an earlier traffic conviction before any of these French offences were committed but in general it would appear that he has settled down as a devoted family man caring for his family.

There is no explanation from the requesting state for its inaction between 2009 and 2011. I accept that there is the information that is summarised in the warrant that there was an ineffective request for judicial assistance but it is extremely puzzling, given the continuity of the address and the information that is likely to have been known about the appellant by the French authorities, as to why that request was ineffective, but there it is. Certainly a failure to issue an accusation warrant that might have led to an arrest, since his whereabouts must have been known to the British police, has never been explained or explored. That is a significant omission from the evidence and, in my judgment, is evidence of some degree of culpable delay, as is the period between 2001 and 2013 in failing to issue a European Arrest Warrant. The speed with which such a warrant was issued in the like case of Cousins make a contrast.

As against that, I accept first, as the judge below found, and has been submitted to me by Mr Sternberg, that this is certainly not a trivial offence. On any view, the amount of the VAT evaded is very substantial. It is clearly a serious offence from which a custodial penalty is likely, even if on retrial the family circumstances of the appellant could be taken into account in the event that he were to be convicted. Second, I also accept that oppression means something more than mere hardship and it cannot simply be established by fathering a child alone. There must be delay that is more than the ordinary course of criminal process in a requesting state that has always to balance competing resources. Thirdly, I accept that there is no suggestion in this case that it could be unjust to extradite him. The French criminal procedure has to comply with Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights, and the point he makes as to identity theft will be a defence available to him which he could explain with evidence if he so wishes to. In that context, the fact that he would be entitled to set aside the conviction in due course is of significance.

I nevertheless conclude that the judge to some extent misdirected himself on this question. He deals with passage of time at paragraph 18 of his judgment. He says he is prepared to adopt the approach of Keith J, although he is not convinced that this is the correct thing to do in a conviction case, by which I understand he was concerned by the attempt to re-characterise it as an abuse of process where the statute on one reading appeared to go the other way. That is the construction of the statute I have dealt with and, of course, I sympathise with the judge but I conclude that the problem is a little simpler than was argued before him.

Secondly, I differ from the judge as to whether this is a case of unjustified delay on the part of the French authorities. Bearing in mind what Lord Diplock said in Kakis, the question is primarily the effect of the delay as opposed to whose responsibility it was but greater weight can be attached to culpable delay. Although this is not the worst case of unexplained failure to pursue criminal inquiries, there are two significant periods of lapse which, in my judgment, on the face of the evidence are the responsibility of the French authorities.

Third, the judge said that any such delay could not have led him to dwell in a situation akin to that of false issue of security. Of course, this is not a case where the French authorities had written to Mr Rahman saying: "We note that you are accused of being concerned in this offence, we are not going to take the matter any further", as might have been the case in Kakis itself, nor is it a case where they had taken some steps to Mr Rahman's knowledge but then had not done anything about them. Nevertheless, assuming Mr Rahman had some knowledge about these offences in 2007 and 2008, contrary to what he tells us, the fact that nothing apparently happened until 2013 would contribute to a false sense that the matter was not being prosecuted when unbeknownst to him it had been.

Fourth, the judge concluded that the fact that he could reopen the conviction was a part of an answer as to why it was not oppressive to return. I already recognised the strength of that when looking at the unjust limb but I cannot see that that is a weighty factor when looking at the oppressive limb, despite Mr Sternberg's submissions to the contrary. Under the oppression limb what has to be considered is whether there is oppression by reason of the fact that he is to be returned to face trial at all when he had not imagined that that was the case when he established his family and developed and increased his family in the years 2008 to 2013. Equally, it is undoubtedly the case, as in fact it seems happened in the case of Cousins upon her return, that this appellant will be held in custody at least until the question of retrial is fixed upon, he not having any links with France and the French treating him at least as a conviction case. All of that is relevant to oppression and is not mitigated by the fact that his conviction was not a final one. I therefore conclude that there are substantial pointers to the overall conclusion that the delay in this case is oppressive. However, I shall reserve the final conclusion until examining the case from the perspective of Article 8.

Z suffers from cystic fibrosis, a condition from birth. That has required a very extensive set of medical treatments at GP level and at consultant level and has required a cocktail of medication and physiotherapy upon her young body, the requirements of which are likely to increase with age. According to the appellant's statement, she requires three sessions of physiotherapy each day, each lasting some 15 to 20 minutes. Although precisely the physical actions are not described in full, they are required to make her vomit, and her illness in particular is concerned with her nutrition and the effects upon her development of health of her difficulties with nutrition. There is strong evidence that this is a role that the appellant undertakes personally and he also plays a leading role in bringing the child to specialists for regular medical check-ups. His wife speaks not very good English despite the 7 years that she has spent in this country. She also is not used to dealing with professionals, she does not work, she cannot drive and she finds the physical exercises that have to be done with her daughter somewhat distressing to observe. So loss of the appellant even for a year or 18 months or so will mean loss of the breadwinner; loss of the person who is able to transport Z to her various medical appointments, and there have been difficulties in complying with the medical appointments in the past, of concern to the medical professionals; loss of the person who has actually been engaging in this intimate therapy with a child who is now increasingly aware of who looking after her and her contacts with the world, and some diminished capacity to communicate speedily and effectively with the various professionals, health and social services departments engaged in supervising her care. That cumulatively appears to me to be a striking case of an unusual degree of parental involvement by the father and breadwinner in a young girl's upbringing. Nevertheless, I accept Mr Sternberg's submissions that he is not the sole carer and that, if he is to be removed, a combination of the mother, the health professionals, the social services and some support from the extended family, with whom there is close contact, does provide a significant degree of substitute care.

My attention has been drawn to a recent decision of A v Germany, decided in the Divisional Court on 19 June 2014, of which no transcript is available. It is not possible to compare the facts of like cases but that was a case with a sole carer from Germany with a mentally disabled 12-year-old daughter for an offence that was considered particularly serious in the context of international co-operation and where it was held that extradition was not disproportionate.

I accept that there may be some criticism again of the approach of the judge in that he did not identify as an important and powerful consideration in the Article 8 balance that the welfare of the child is a primary, though not determinative, consideration: see HH v Deputy Prosecutor of the Italian Republic, Genoa [2012] UKSC 25 reported at [2012] 3 WLR 90 at paragraph 9, where the well known authority of ZH(Tanzania) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2011] 2 AC 166 is cited. At paragraph 32 of HH the following is spelled out by Lady Hale giving the principle judgment of the Supreme Court:

"The second main criticism of the approach in later cases is that the courts have not been examining carefully the nature and extent of the interference in family life. In focussing on 'some quite exceptionally compelling feature' (para 56 in Norris), they have fallen into the trap identified by Lord Mance, tending

'to divert attention from consideration of the potential impact of extradition on the particular persons involved . . . towards a search for factors (particularly external factors) which can be regarded as out of the run of the mill'

(para 109). Some particularly grave consequences are not out of the run of the mill at all. Once again, the test is always whether the gravity of the interference with family life is justified by the gravity of the public interest pursued."

34. Applying that test, this being a serious allegation of fraud and there being some significant mechanisms to assist the child, it is quite likely that the conclusion, even on Article 8 and even putting the welfare of the child as a very important factor in the balance, would still not have resulted in this appeal being allowed. But here the delay already considered under the oppression limb also comes into play. This is a case of a British citizen resident in his own country who has got on with his life since 2007 and established a sound family life here as a working father and a caring father and an active father in the care of his sick child's health. It would have been one thing to have deferred having a family or increasing it whilst an accusation of criminal conduct was pursued at the trial and then dealt with by punishments if a conviction was a result of it but in the particular circumstances, combining the delay itself for the reasons I have dealt with in the section 14 limb and the impact upon the family life of this particular family, particularly with the young child's health considerations, I consider that the use of a conviction in absentia rather than a prompt request and an issue of an accusation warrant has resulted in important changes in this young man's family and private life. Combined with the significant impact of removal on the welfare of the daughter, I conclude that it is in this case both oppressive and contrary to section 14 and a violation of his Article 8 rights to remove him now. This appeal is accordingly allowed.

MR LLOYD: My Lord, forgive me, I really ought to have raised this earlier but I was going to address you on the reporting of the identity of the children, which your Lordship has very kindly dealt with by not mentioning their names, so I do not know whether I need to make a formal application for that order but one other thing I was going to address is the question of their address, I wonder whether that could be perhaps not included in the final transcript because, of course, that would give some sort of ability for people to identify who they are.

MR JUSTICE BLAKE: Mr Sternberg, do you have any submissions?

MR STERNBERG: No, my Lord.

MR JUSTICE BLAKE: I appreciate one is looking not merely at your interests but the interests of the press as representatives of the public who may be interested in reading this judgment. I will direct that the identity and address of the child be not disclosed in any report of this case, and I will have to consider when I get the transcript back just what annotations I will make.

MR LLOYD: It is my fault, I meant to raise it.

MR JUSTICE BLAKE: I thought about it but I needed to deal with the address in open court for the reasons I have given. I will adjust the transcript when I get to look at it.

MR LLOYD: I am extremely grateful, my Lord. May I ask that our costs be assessed in terms of the public funding certificate.

MR JUSTICE BLAKE: Yes. Anything else?

MR STERNBERG: My Lord, no application. Plainly, if those who instruct me wish to take the matter further, they have 14 days.

MR JUSTICE BLAKE: If they want me to certify a point, I think it would make (Inaudible).

MR STERNBERG: We will cross that bridge when we come to it.

MR JUSTICE BLAKE: Thank you very much.