England fan to be extradited to Portugal – supporters

An England football fan sentenced to jail in Portugal for rioting at the Euro 2004 finals will be extradited on Wednesday to serve a two-year sentence after a legal fight, his campaigners said.

Garry Mann, 52, will travel from London Heathrow airport to Lisbon and then be transferred to an as yet undisclosed prison, Fair Trials International said.

Mann was convicted over a riot in the Algarve resort of Albufeira but says he never received a fair trial.

Lawyers for the former firefighter failed in their last-ditch attempt to secure a judicial review at the High Court last week.

Mann said: “I have been let down by the politicians that agreed to the UK’s rigid extradition laws and the European arrest warrant and by the judges who no longer seem willing to stand up for justice.”

Jago Russell, of Fair Trials International, claims Mann’s trial was a “travesty of justice” and the decision to extradite him an “outrage”.

He said Tuesday: “Politicians in the UK and Europe must now wake up to the injustice being caused under Europe’s fast track extradition system and reform it before countless others suffer the same fate as Garry.”

Mann was tried and convicted within 48 hours of the riot in Albufeira, where England and rival fans gathered in between matches.

He argues that CCTV pictures show he was drinking with friends in a bar as fans clashed some distance away.

British courts reluctantly turned down appeals against extradition, with one High Court judge declaring that he had suffered “a serious injustice” and the European Court of Human Rights refused last month to intervene in his case.