Brudnicka and Others v. Poland (dec.)

Information Note on the Court’s case-law 49

January 2003

Brudnicka and Others v. Poland (dec.) - 54723/00

Decision 16.1.2003 [Section III]

Article 6

Civil proceedings

Article 6-1

Impartial tribunal

Impartiality of the Maritime Chambers: admissible

Article 35

Article 35-1

Exhaustion of domestic remedies

Effective domestic remedy

Effectiveness of constitutional complaint: admissible

The applicants are the wives and mothers of sailors who died when their ship was lost in the Baltic, and were parties in proceedings brought in the Maritime Chamber at the Regional Court in Szczecin to establish the causes of the disaster.  In its decision, the court blamed the ship’s captain, the technical crew-members and the Polish Shipping Register officials who had verified the state of the ship before the disaster, and the Polish rescue services.  This decision was set aside by the Maritime Appeal Chamber at the Regional Court in Gdansk.  The Maritime Chamber in Gdansk subsequently found that failings on the part of the crew and the ship’s owners, as well as natural causes, had all contributed.  Finally, the Maritime Appeal Chamber went some way towards confirming that negligence by the ship’s owners and crew had caused the accident, and strongly criticised the rescue operations.

Admissible under Article 6 § 1, as far as the eleven original applicants are concerned, the question of their victim status being joined to the merits, except in the case of one applicant. 

Concerning the Government’s preliminary objection that domestic remedies had not been exhausted, since no constitutional appeal had been brought: In the form in which it exists in Polish law, this remedy may be used only against a legal provision taken as the basis for settlement of a dispute.  In this case, the Government argues that it could be used against the regulations on the composition of maritime chambers.  However, these regulations have no bearing on the merits, and this means that a constitutional appeal – if possible - would never have been an effective remedy in this situation: rejection of the preliminary objection.

Concerning the possibility of bringing a civil action for damages, referred to by the Government in connection with Article 35 § 1: The Government has failed to indicate against whom such an action would lie, and has cited no examples of its being used successfully in connection with disasters at sea: rejection of the preliminary objection.

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This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.

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