Portugal Extradition Law — Case Law, Legal Framework and Procedure
Extradition cases involving Portugal — Requested and Requesting State
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Read → Council of Europe anti-torture Committee (CPT) · 21 Oct 2025
Case Law
Sentenced-person transfer request may be processed despite a final extradition decision
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Summary
The Court of Justice of Santa Catarina considered whether a request to transfer the execution of a Brazilian sentence to Portugal could be processed despite a final Portuguese decision authorising the convicted person’s extradition to Brazil. The Court held that sentenced-person transfer is an autonomous and potentially alternative mechanism of international legal cooperation and that the prior extradition decision did not make the transfer request legally inadmissible. It therefore reversed the lower court’s refusal and authorised the request to be forwarded to Brazil’s central authority, the Department of Asset Recovery and International Legal Cooperation, for administrative assessment and formal consultation with Portugal. The Court did not order the transfer itself, which remained subject to the agreement of both States and verification of the applicable statutory and treaty requirements. A subsequent decision of the Criciúma Criminal Enforcement Court confirmed that conditional release does not extinguish the remaining sentence and therefore does not prevent the administrative processing of the transfer request. The existing supervision conditions were maintained pending the decision of the competent Brazilian and Portuguese authorities.
14/10/2025 · Court of Justice of the State of Santa Catarina, Second Criminal Chamber · Criminal Enforcement Appeal No. 8001205-48.2025.8.24.0020/SC
🇵🇹Portugal → 🇧🇷Brazil
Procedural orderOtherCountry Contributor
Tiago da Costa Andrade
Morais Leitão, Galvão Teles, Soares da Silva & Associados
Principal associate at Morais Leitão, Galvão Teles, Soares da Silva & Associados.
Tiago advises and represents clients in cases involving property and economic-financial criminal law, as well as transnational and European criminal law, particularly in matters of prevention and in criminal litigation relating to property, tax, subsidy and cyber fraud, corruption and other offences committed by public officials or political office-holders, and money laundering, including cases falling within the competence of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office.
Currently, his practice has also been focusing on preventive advice and representing clients in cases of international judicial cooperation in criminal matters, notably regarding extradition, the European arrest warrant, mutual legal assistance, as well as challenging the processing of data by Interpol concerning wanted persons.
Tiago also has experience in criminal proceedings relating to defamation and freedom of expression, child abduction and domestic violence, and offences against life or physical integrity.
Tiago was an Assistant Teacher at the Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra, as part of the Department of Criminal Law, where he taught Criminal Law. Previously, he was a Teaching Assistant, having contributed to the Criminal Procedural Law course at the Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra. He currently collaborates with Duarte Santana Lopes in teaching the Interdisciplinary Legal Practice course at the Nova University School of Law.
Tiago advises and represents clients in cases involving property and economic-financial criminal law, as well as transnational and European criminal law, particularly in matters of prevention and in criminal litigation relating to property, tax, subsidy and cyber fraud, corruption and other offences committed by public officials or political office-holders, and money laundering, including cases falling within the competence of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office.
Currently, his practice has also been focusing on preventive advice and representing clients in cases of international judicial cooperation in criminal matters, notably regarding extradition, the European arrest warrant, mutual legal assistance, as well as challenging the processing of data by Interpol concerning wanted persons.
Tiago also has experience in criminal proceedings relating to defamation and freedom of expression, child abduction and domestic violence, and offences against life or physical integrity.
Tiago was an Assistant Teacher at the Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra, as part of the Department of Criminal Law, where he taught Criminal Law. Previously, he was a Teaching Assistant, having contributed to the Criminal Procedural Law course at the Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra. He currently collaborates with Duarte Santana Lopes in teaching the Interdisciplinary Legal Practice course at the Nova University School of Law.
Country Contributor
Vânia Costa Ramos
Carlos Pinto de Abreu e Associados
Vânia Costa Ramos is the Managing Partner at Carlos Pinto de Abreu e Associados, a law firm based in Lisbon, Portugal. Vânia heads the firm’s international, European, extradition, and mutual legal assistance practices. She represents clients before Portuguese courts, the Court of Justice of the European Union, the European Court of Human Rights and other regional and international bodies. She provides counsel to both the accused and victims of criminal conduct. In April 2010, Vânia became a member of the Fair Trials Legal Experts Advisory Panel. From February 2016 to March 2022, she served as the Chairperson of Forum Penal, the Association of Portuguese Criminal Lawyers. Since December 2016, Vânia has been a member of the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) where she represents Portugal. In September 2024, Vânia was elected the Chairperson of the European Criminal Bar Association (ECBA). Vânia holds a Master's degree in criminal law and is a Ph.D. candidate in criminal procedure at the University of Lisbon, where she was a teaching assistant. Vânia is actively involved in academic life and is a scientific collaborator at the Free University of Brussels (ULB) and the European Criminal Law Clinic. She is a prolific author and contributor to numerous publications. Her work has appeared in Fair Trials Bulletin, Bulletin of the Order of Advocates (Portugal), Portuguese Journal of Criminal Science, Public Prosecutions Review, Anatomy of Crime, New Journal of European Criminal Law (NJECL) and Transnational Criminal Law Review.
Country Contributor
Constança Calçada Soares
Carlos Pinto de Abreu e Associados
Constança Calçada Soares is a Lawyer at Carlos Pinto de Abreu e Associados, a law firm based in Lisbon, Portugal, where she has been working since 2024, following her professional traineeship with the firm, which began in 2022. She also completed a short-term internship at the same firm earlier that year.
Her practice focuses primarily on Criminal Law, Family and Children Law, and Human Rights.
Alongside her legal practice, she has been serving as a lecturer at the Instituto para o Desenvolvimento Social (IDS) since 2022, teaching within the Legal Services Technician programme.
Constança Calçada Soares graduated in Law from the Faculty of Law of the University of Lisbon in 2021 and is currently completing a Master’s Degree in Law and Legal Practice, specialising in Criminal Law, at the same university, pending the defence of her dissertation.
Her academic and professional training includes several specialised courses and seminars in areas connected to criminal law, human rights, privacy, migration law, constitutional justice, public international law, aviation law, health law, criminology and criminal investigation. Among others, she attended the ERA course on Data Protection and the Law Enforcement Directive (2024), the ELSA Academy on Migration Law (2020), and intensive courses on the right to privacy and family life, constitutional justice in Europe, and public international law.
Her practice focuses primarily on Criminal Law, Family and Children Law, and Human Rights.
Alongside her legal practice, she has been serving as a lecturer at the Instituto para o Desenvolvimento Social (IDS) since 2022, teaching within the Legal Services Technician programme.
Constança Calçada Soares graduated in Law from the Faculty of Law of the University of Lisbon in 2021 and is currently completing a Master’s Degree in Law and Legal Practice, specialising in Criminal Law, at the same university, pending the defence of her dissertation.
Her academic and professional training includes several specialised courses and seminars in areas connected to criminal law, human rights, privacy, migration law, constitutional justice, public international law, aviation law, health law, criminology and criminal investigation. Among others, she attended the ERA course on Data Protection and the Law Enforcement Directive (2024), the ELSA Academy on Migration Law (2020), and intensive courses on the right to privacy and family life, constitutional justice in Europe, and public international law.
Country Contributor
Eduardo Maurício
Eduardo Mauricio Advocacia
Eduardo Maurício is an international criminal defence lawyer admitted to practise in Brazil, Portugal, Hungary and Spain, with a particular focus on extradition proceedings and cross-border criminal litigation.
He regularly appears before higher courts and has extensive experience in matters involving international judicial cooperation and INTERPOL-related issues.
He holds a PhD in Criminal Law from the University of Salamanca, a Master’s degree in Law from the University of Coimbra, and several postgraduate qualifications, including in Criminal Law and Criminology from PUC/RS, in Legal Sciences from the Faculty of Law of the Catholic University of Lisbon, and in International and European Economic Criminal Law from the University of Coimbra.
In addition to his legal practice, Eduardo Maurício is a professor, international speaker and legal commentator.
He regularly appears before higher courts and has extensive experience in matters involving international judicial cooperation and INTERPOL-related issues.
He holds a PhD in Criminal Law from the University of Salamanca, a Master’s degree in Law from the University of Coimbra, and several postgraduate qualifications, including in Criminal Law and Criminology from PUC/RS, in Legal Sciences from the Faculty of Law of the Catholic University of Lisbon, and in International and European Economic Criminal Law from the University of Coimbra.
In addition to his legal practice, Eduardo Maurício is a professor, international speaker and legal commentator.
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