Published on 18 May 2026
FIRST SECTION
Application no. 1359/25
E.O.O.
against Italy
lodged on 28 December 2024
communicated on 29 April 2026
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns the impossibility for the applicant, the father of a child born in 2010, to exercise his contact rights.
The applicant submits that proceedings had been instituted in 2011 before the Juvenile Court with a view to assessing his parental capacity and subsequently declaring the child adoptable. Those proceedings ended with a judgment of the Court of Appeal dated 23 August 2023, which confirmed that the child was adoptable and ordered the gradual resumption of contacts between the applicant and this son.
The applicant complains, under Article 8 of the Convention, that he has not been able to meet his son since August 2018 and notes that the lack of contact continued despite the Court of Appeal having ordered, on 23 August 2023, the gradual resumption of contacts. He further complains that the domestic courts merely delegated to the social services all decisions concerning the modalities of the exercise of his contact rights and that the social services failed to take any measures to ensure the gradual resumption of contact with his son. Under Articles 8 and 13 of the Convention the applicant also complains about the lack of effective remedies for the prompt restoration of his family ties to avoid a de facto determination of the matter.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Has there been a violation of the applicant’s right to respect for his family life under Article 8 of the Convention on account of the lack of implementation of his contact rights (A.I. v. Italy, no. 70896/17, §§ 86-89 and 99, 1 April 2021), having particular regard to the fact that, notwithstanding the Court of Appeal’s judgment of 23 August 2023, the social services did not arrange any contact between the applicant and his son (A and Others v. Italy, no. 17791/22, § 103, 7 September 2023, and Terna v. Italy, no. 21052/18, §§ 67 and 72, 14 January 2021)?
2. Did the applicant have at his disposal, as required by Article 13 of the Convention, effective domestic remedies through which he could have raised his complaints under Article 8?