An Australian citizen may surrender to an extradition request under section 18 of the Extradition Act 1988 (Cth). There are two preconditions under section 18(1) that must be satisfied in order for a person to surrender:
- The person has been arrested under a provisional warrant and is on remand under section 15; and
- The Attorney-General has issued a notice pursuant to section 16 that an extradition request has been received
Once they are before a magistrate, the person may then provide consent to surrender to the extradition request. Assuming the consent was given voluntarily, the magistrate will then advise the person that:
- The effect of their consent will be either committal to prison, or, release on bail (without any proceedings to determine whether they will be extradited); and
- That they will be surrendered to the extradition country if the Attorney-General issues a warrant.
If after being informed about the effects of consenting the person again agrees to consent, the magistrate will issue a warrant to commit the person to prison (s 18(2)(b)), with bail being withheld unless special circumstances exist justifying the release (s 18(3)).
The Attorney-General is then immediately informed in writing of the offence(s) in respect of which consent has been given, at which point the Attorney-General can issue a warrant authorising the person’s surrender: see DPP (Cth) v Kainhofer (1995) 185 CLR 528.
