Minister to outline 'options' in deportation case to daughters and mother who lied in asylum application 15 years ago

By Ann O'Loughlin

The Minister for Justice Charlie Flanagan is to put "certain options” to a mother and her two Irish-born daughters, aged eight and 13, who are fighting orders for their deportation to the mother’s native Georgia, the High Court has heard.

The development came after Mr Justice Richard Humphreys indicated last Friday he considered the deportation orders are “disproportionate” for reasons including the woman has been here for 15 years and her children, who have never been outside Ireland, are rooted here.

The judge indicated he intended to find against the Minister in a written judgment if necessary but adjourned the matter to allow lawyers for the Minister consider what he had said.

Today Siobhán Stack SC, for the Minister, said she was instructed to seek a further adjournment of two weeks so “certain options” could be put to the family.

Garry O’Halloran BL, for the family, consented to the adjournment in those circumstances.

The case concerns Lela Sivsivadze, who came here in 2003, and her two children, Mariam (aged 13) and Sofia (aged 8).

On Friday, Mr O’Halloran urged the judge to overturn the deportation orders for reasons including arguments the children’s rights had not been properly taken into account.

The children have lived all their lives here, have never travelled outside Ireland, attend school here, speak Irish and know “almost nothing of Georgia”, he said.

The Minister for Justice’s 2017 decision to deport them arising from lies told by the mother in her asylum application 15 years ago is “so disproportionate” in a democratic society it’s “off the radar”, he said.

Those lies, the court heard, were to the effect she was fleeing an abusive stepfather in Georgia who did not exist. She was rather coming here to seek work.

Counsel said it is accepted there is a duty on everyone to tell truth at all times and that his client had told it late in day. However, the State response revoking the family’s humanitarian leave to remain and ordering their deportation was totally disproportionate, he argued.

Her children should not be punished for those lies, which she had disclosed some years ago in other court proceedings unsuccessfully challenging the deportation of her husband, also from Georgia.

He was deported in 2011 and Ms Sivsivadze has said he has no home or employment in Georgia and she and the children had nowhere to live if they were deported.

Mr O’Halloran said the case was essentially about the rights of children to have their position considered independently of the conduct of their parents. The older girl was already very distressed arising from the deportation of her father to Georgia seven years ago, he added. The family’s only contact with him is via Skype.

Documents concerning the family which the court had sought from the State showed nothing to suggest humanitarian leave to remain previously granted to the family was dependent on the mother not having provided false and misleading information, he also argued. A memo indicated the leave to remain was granted as an exceptional measure.

Siobhan Stack SC, for the Minister, said Ms Sivsivadze had previously secured permission to remain here on humanitarian grounds and that permission could be revoked if false and misleading information was provided.

Ms Sivsivadze’s parents are alive and still living in Georgia, her husband is also there and there was no evidence to support the claims he is homeless and unemployed, she also argued.

During exchanges with counsel, Mr Justice Humphreys said it was widely known that many people tell lies in the immigration process but that few admit to those.

"We are all against immigration fraud but very few own up to it," he said.

Ms Sivsivadze has been here 15 years and the State has come down on her like a “ton of bricks” because she was either “honest or naive” enough to have owned up to the lies, he remarked. "Where is the incentive to come clean if this happens?"

Ms Stack said the mother "created this situation for herself" and the case should be considered in the context of all the documents, not just the memo.