Thomas Wahl

Senior Researcher

Main Focus

Thomas Wahl spe­cial­izes in European crim­in­al law. He fo­cuses on the leg­al in­stru­ments ad­op­ted at the level of the European Uni­on and the Coun­cil of Europe that har­mon­ize crim­in­al law, foster mu­tu­al co­oper­a­tion between law en­force­ment au­thor­it­ies, and es­tab­lish cent­ral act­ors re­spons­ible for the in­vest­ig­a­tion, pro­sec­u­tion, and pre­ven­tion of crime. His cur­rent re­search more spe­cific­ally ad­dresses the fol­low­ing is­sues:

  • Ex­tra­di­tion law, in par­tic­u­lar a com­par­is­on between the sur­render of per­sons via the European Ar­rest War­rant (based on the prin­ciple of mu­tu­al re­cog­ni­tion of ju­di­cial de­cisions) and “con­ven­tion­al” ex­tra­di­tions on the basis of the leg­al frame­work of the Coun­cil of Europe;
  • In­ter­na­tion­al co­oper­a­tion in crim­in­al mat­ters and the pub­lic or­der;
  • Mu­tu­al leg­al as­sist­ance, in par­tic­u­lar the use of evid­ence gathered abroad;
  • European In­vest­ig­a­tion Or­der;
  • Data pro­tec­tion in po­lice and ju­di­cial co-op­er­a­tion in Europe;
  • New ar­chi­tec­ture of European law en­force­ment, in par­tic­u­lar the European Pub­lic Pro­sec­utor’s Of­fice;
  • Pro­ced­ur­al safe­guards, in par­tic­u­lar their har­mon­iz­a­tion by EU law;
  • Com­bat­ing ter­ror­ism with­in the EU.

Curriculum Vitae

Thomas Wahl has been Head of the Sec­tion for “European Crim­in­al Law” since Feb­ru­ary 2016, a po­s­i­tion he also held in the years 2004 to 2009. From 2009 to 2011 he worked at the Fed­er­al Of­fice of Justice (Bundes­amt für Jus­tiz) in the units (Refer­ate) for "Ex­tra­di­tion, En­force­ment As­sist­ance, Mu­tu­al Leg­al As­sist­ance, EJN [Aus­liefer­ung, Voll­streck­ungs- und Recht­shil­fe, EJN],“ „Crim­in­o­logy, Crim­in­al Pre­ven­tions, Ju­di­cial Stat­ist­ics,“ [Krim­in­o­lo­gie, Krim­in­al­präven­tion, Jus­tizstat­istik] and “Dis­cip­lin­ary Fin­ing Pro­ceed­ings for breach of dis­clos­ure ob­lig­a­tions in ac­cord­ance with the Ger­man Com­mer­cial Code [Ord­nungs­geld­verfahren bei Jahresab­schlüssen].“ Between 2011 and 2013 he served as na­tion­al ex­pert for Ger­many in the EU fun­ded pro­ject „An Ad­di­tion­al Eval­u­ation Mech­an­ism on Ju­di­cial Co­oper­a­tion in Crim­in­al Mat­ters. Pi­lot pro­ject on the con­di­tions for is­su­ing a European Ar­rest War­rant, in par­tic­u­lar re­lat­ing to the pro­por­tion­al­ity of the de­cision,” a joint col­lab­or­a­tion with the Min­is­tries of Justice of the Neth­er­lands and France.

Sub­sequently, Thomas Wahl as­sumed a re­search po­s­i­tion with the KORSE net­work in the Centre for Se­cur­ity and Society at the Uni­versity of Freiburg i.Br./Ger­many. He did re­search on the “Shift­ing of in­terests in European ex­tra­di­tion law” and provided ex­pert­ise on oth­er ques­tions of European se­cur­ity law.
Thomas Wahl con­trib­uted to nu­mer­ous re­search pro­jects on vari­ous top­ics of European crim­in­al law such as „Sys­tem­at­iz­a­tion and present­a­tion of European and European­ized crim­in­al law [Sys­tem­at­ische Darstel­lung des Europäis­chen Stra­frechts],“ „Hand­book on civil se­cur­ity [Recht­shand­buch zivile Sich­er­heit],“ a study for the European Par­lia­ment en­titled „Crim­in­al pro­ced­ur­al laws across the European Uni­on – A com­par­at­ive ana­lys­is of se­lec­ted main dif­fer­ences and the im­pact they have over the de­vel­op­ment of EU le­gis­la­tion [coun­try re­port on Ger­many],” an ECLAN-study on „The fu­ture of mu­tu­al re­cog­ni­tion in crim­in­al mat­ters in the European Uni­on [coun­try re­port Ger­many],“ and a study for OLAF on „De­vel­op­ment of an EU Eval­u­ation Mech­an­ism in the area of Anti-Cor­rup­tion with a par­tic­u­lar fo­cus on identi­fy­ing and re­du­cing the costs of cor­rup­tion in Pub­lic Pro­cure­ment in­volving EU Funds.“

Thoas Wahl is man­aging ed­it­or of „eu­crim“. “eu­crim” is an on­line plat­form that serves as a Europe-wide for­um for European crim­in­al law and in­tends to en­cour­age dis­cus­sion among both prac­ti­tion­ers and aca­dem­ics. The pub­lic­a­tion is co-fin­anced by the European Com­mis­sion and each journ­al is­sue is ded­ic­ated to a spe­cif­ic top­ic of European crim­in­al law. Thomas Wahl’s ed­it­or­i­al func­tions in­clude the ana­lys­is and present­a­tion of cur­rent de­vel­op­ments in the European Uni­on and the Coun­cil of Europe re­lated to crim­in­al law. He is also re­spons­ible for main­tain­ing the high stand­ard of qual­ity re­quired for sci­entif­ic art­icles pub­lished on­line and/or in the journ­al.

Thomas Wahl co-foun­ded the „ex­tra­di­tion for­um“ in 2016, which provides a set­ting for prac­ti­tion­ers and aca­dem­ics to dis­cuss on a reg­u­lar basis cur­rent de­vel­op­ments, top­ics and cases in­volving in­ter­na­tion­al ex­tra­di­tion and the European Ar­rest War­rant.


Project

Shifts in Interests in European Extradition Law

Head of project: Thomas Wahl
The surrender of criminal suspects who flee to foreign countries has sparked controversy for centuries. Relevant ex­tra­dition law shows not only criminal law’s territorial limits, but the dissolution of tension between security through effective cross-border enforcement and protecting individual rights. more

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