Communicated on 12 May 2016
THIRD SECTION
Application no. 56987/15
A.B.V.
against Russia
lodged on 27 October 2015
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The applicant, Mr A.B.V., is a Russian national who was born in 1977 and lives in Zheleznodorozhniy, a town in the Moscow Region.
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
From 2008 the applicant lived together with A.D. in an extramarital relationship.
They separated shortly after A.D. became pregnant in October or November 2009, but continued to maintain regular contact.
On 6 July 2010 A.D. gave birth to a baby girl, P.
In January 2011 A.D. started avoiding communication with the applicant and preventing his visits to the child.
On 6 June 2011 the applicant brought court proceedings seeking establishment of his paternity of the child and determination of the terms of his contact with the latter.
On 25 June 2012 the Nagatinskiy District Court of Moscow (“the District Court”) discontinued the examination of the applicant’s claim in so far as it concerned the determination of his contact rights. The District Court reasoned that such claims could only be brought by one of the child’s parents and on the date of its examination of the claim in question, the applicant’s paternity of the child had not been established.
On the same day the District Court established the applicant’s paternity of P.
On 20 December 2012 the Moscow City Court (“the City Court”) quashed the judgment of 25 June 2012 establishing the applicant’s paternity of the child and dismissed the applicant’s claim.
On 4 October 2013 the Presidium of the City Court, in a cassation procedure, quashed the judgment of 25 June 2012 and the appeal decision of 20 December 2012 and referred the case for a fresh examination.
On 29 October 2013 A.D.’s partner, A.K., was registered as the child’s father.
On 11 November 2013 the applicant brought new court proceedings challenging the registration of A.K. as the child’s father, seeking the establishment of his paternity of the child and the determination of his contact rights with the latter.
On 13 November 2013 the District Court discontinued the examination of the applicant’s initial claims in respect of the applicant’s action of 11 November 2013.
On 24 January 2014 the District Court ordered that A.K.’s registration as the child’s father be cancelled, established the applicant’s paternity of the child, and held that contact between the applicant and his daughter should take place at A.D.’s place of residence on the first Saturday and second Sunday of every month from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
On 28 July 2014 the City Court upheld the judgment of 24 January 2014 on appeal.
On 5 December 2014, after failed attempts to have the judgment of 24 January 2014 ‒ as upheld on appeal on 28 July 2014 ‒ enforced voluntarily by A.D., the applicant applied to the bailiffs’ service for the institution of enforcement proceedings.
On 12 December 2014 a bailiff from the Tsaritsynskiy District Bailiffs’ Service in Moscow refused to institute such enforcement proceedings, because the operative part of the judgment did not oblige A.D. to carry out or to abstain from certain actions.
On 4 February 2015 the applicant challenged the lawfulness of the above decision.
On 18 March 2015 the District Court rejected the applicant’s claim.
On 6 July 2015 the City Court quashed the above judgment and held that the decision of 12 December 2014 refusing the institution of enforcement proceedings had been unlawful.
In the meantime, on 13 January 2015 the applicant applied to the District Court for clarification of the operative part of the judgment of 24 January 2014.
On 27 January 2015 the District Court informed the applicant that the case was being referred to the City Court for examination in a cassation review procedure and that the applicant’s request for clarification could therefore only be examined once the case was back with the District Court.
On 27 January 2015 the applicant instituted court proceedings seeking to obtain compensation for the unreasonable length of the proceedings in his case.
On 17 March 2015 the City Court disallowed the applicant’s claim. The City Court subdivided the proceedings into two parts – from 6 June 2011 to 13 November 2013 and from 11 November 2013 to 28 July 2014. The complaint concerning the first set of proceedings was dismissed as being lodged out of time and the complaint concerning the second set of proceedings was held to be manifestly ill-founded. The judgment of 17 March 2015 was published on the website of the City Court.
On 17 April 2015 the applicant requested that the City Court remove the judgment of 17 March 2015 from the public domain as it disclosed information pertaining to his private and family life.
On 29 April 2015 the City Court replied that the subject-matter of the judgment of 17 March 2015 did not fall within the group of cases which the law prohibited from being published.
On 10 August 2015 a bailiff from the Tsaritsynskiy District Bailiffs’ Service instituted enforcement proceedings in respect of the judgment of 24 January 2014.
It appears that the authorities were unable to offer effective assistance to the applicant in the enforcement of the judgment of 24 January 2014.
COMPLAINTS
The applicant complained under Article 8 of the Convention about the failure of the domestic authorities to offer him effective assistance in securing contact with his daughter in accordance with the contact schedule determined by the domestic court.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Has there been a violation of the applicant’s right to respect for his family life, contrary to Article 8 of the Convention?
2. Did the State comply with its positive obligation to safeguard the applicant’s right to respect for his family life guaranteed by Article 8 of the Convention? In particular, have the domestic authorities taken all necessary steps to secure the applicant’s contact with the child in accordance with the contact schedule set up by the judgment of the Nagatinskiy District Court of Moscow of 24 January 2014?
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