Information Note on the Court’s case-law No. 116
February 2009
Eerikäinen and Others v. Finland - 3514/02
Judgment 10.2.2009 [Section IV]
Article 10
Article 10-1
Freedom of expression
Insufficiency of grounds given by Supreme Court for awarding damages against magazine for identifying criminal defendant: violation
Facts: The applicants were the publishing company and editor-in-chief of a magazine and one of its journalists. In 1997 the magazine published an article on the abuse of social benefits and, under the headline: “It seemed legal, but... a woman entrepreneur cheated to obtain a pension of over 2 million marks?”, cited the case of a businesswoman who was facing criminal charges for fraud. Although the article did not mention the woman’s name, it was accompanied by an article on a completely unrelated matter which the journalist had written with her consent for another magazine some years earlier and which did contain her full name and two photographs. The woman sued and the applicants were held jointly liable in damages by a district court for defamation. The district court’s judgment was overturned by a court of appeal. However, following on appeal, the Supreme Court held that, though not guilty of defamation, the applicants had violated the woman’s right to privacy as there had been no need to reveal her identity. They were ordered to pay FIM 20,000 (EUR 3,364) in damages.
Law: The award of damages constituted an interference that was prescribed by law and pursued the legitimate aim of protecting the reputation or rights of others. As to the necessity for the interference, the reporting of the businesswoman’s criminal case in the 1997 article was based on a public document (the bill of indictment) and concerned a matter of legitimate public interest (the abuse of public funds). Its purpose had been to contribute to a public discussion on that subject. The impugned headline was neither excessive nor misleading as it was clearly phrased as a question. The issue of necessity thus fell to be examined essentially from the standpoint of the relevancy and sufficiency of the reasons given by the Supreme Court for requiring the applicants to pay compensation. In the Court’s view, it was not evident that the Supreme Court had attached any importance to the fact that the information in the 1997 article was based on a bill of indictment prepared by the public prosecutor and that the article had clearly stated that the woman had merely been charged. Nor had the Supreme Court analysed the significance of the fact that the photographs had been taken with her consent with a view to publication, albeit in connection with an earlier article and in a different context. Accordingly, the grounds relied on, although relevant, were not sufficient to justify the interference with the applicants’ right to freedom of expression.
Conclusion: violation (unanimously).
Article 41 – EUR 9,179 to the publishing company in respect of pecuniary damage, and EUR 5,000 each to the editor and journalist in respect of non-pecuniary damage.
© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights
This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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