Information Note on the Court’s case-law 10
September 1999
Amhaz v. France (dec.) - 45013/98
Decision 21.9.1999 [Section III]
Article 5
Article 5-3
Length of pre-trial detention
Detention on remand already been found excessively long: inadmissible
The applicant, who was suspected of having murdered his wife, was placed in pre-trial detention from 6 December 1991 to 25 September 1998, when he was sentenced to twenty years’ imprisonment. After making a number of unsuccessful applications for his release pending trial, he lodged a complaint with the Commission about the length of his imprisonment. The Commission adopted its report on 20 March 1997 and, in a judgment of 23 September 1998, the Court concluded that there had been a violation of Article 5 § 3. The applicant now complains again of the length of his pre-trial detention.
Inadmissible under Article 5 § 3: the Court’s judgment had erased the consequences of the violation of Article 5 § 3 in respect of the period from 6 December 1991, the date of the first court decision sentencing the applicant to imprisonment, to 20 March 1997, the date on which the Commission had adopted its report. The period to be taken into consideration in determining whether or not there had been a violation was therefore five months and twenty-four days and did not appear unreasonable in the light of the circumstances of the case: manifestly ill-founded.
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