In 1984, he was an 18-year-old Echols Scholar at the University of Virginia, where he became good friends with Elizabeth Haysom, a Canadian national two years his elder.
[2][3] In October 1985, Söring and Elizabeth Haysom fled to Europe; and, on 30 April 1986, they were arrested in England, United Kingdom, on charges of cheque fraud.
The UK government received only an undertaking from the Commonwealth Attorney of Bedford County to the effect that:- should Jens Söring be convicted of the offence of capital murder as charged in Bedford County, Virginia ... a representation will be made in the name of the United Kingdom to the judge at the time of sentencing that it is the wish of the United Kingdom that the death penalty should not be imposed or carried out.Söring contended that this assurance was worthless.
The Virginia authorities later communicated to the UK government that they would not offer further assurances, as they intended to seek the death penalty against Söring.
Söring's application was declared admissible on 10 November 1988, and the European Commission of Human Rights gave its judgment on 19 January 1989.
[4] Amnesty International intervened in the case and submitted that, in the light of "evolving standards in Western Europe regarding the existence and use of the death penalty", this punishment should be considered as inhuman and degrading and was therefore effectively prohibited by Article 3.
The Court found that it cannot be said that the undertaking to inform the judge at the sentencing stage of the wishes of the United Kingdom eliminates the risk of the death penalty being imposed.
[...] the Commonwealth’s Attorney has himself decided to seek and to persist in seeking the death penalty because the evidence, in his determination, supports such action [...] If the national authority with responsibility for prosecuting the offence takes such a firm stance, it is hardly open to the Court to hold that there are no substantial grounds for believing that the applicant faces a real risk of being sentenced to death.Departing from the commission's ruling, the ECHR concluded that the "death row phenomenon" did breach Article 3.
They highlighted four factors that contributed to the violation: As the ECtHR concluded: [H]aving regard to the very long period of time spent on death row in such extreme conditions, with the ever present and mounting anguish of awaiting execution of the death penalty, and to the personal circumstances of the applicant, especially his age and mental state at the time of the offence, the applicant's extradition to the United States would expose him to a real risk of treatment going beyond the threshold set by Article 3.