Communicated on 26 May 2016
SECOND SECTION
Application no. 29525/15
Pero MARIĆ
against Croatia
lodged on 13 June 2015
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The applicant, Mr Pero Marić, is a Croatian national, who was born in 1945 and lives in Slavonski Brod. He is represented before the Court by Mr P. Krnić, a lawyer practising in Slavonski Brod.
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
The applicant lived in his house in the town of Slavonski Brod, Croatia. Before the escalation of war in Croatia the applicant went to work in Germany.
In 1992 the applicant’s house was mined.
On 12 October 1992 local authorities authorised a certain D.I., then a military policeman, to use the applicant’s house temporarily, and later on gave the same rights to the family of I.D. who were refuges from Bosnia and Herzegovina.
On 27 September 1995 the Temporary Takeover and Management of Certain Property Act (“the Sequestration Act”) entered into force. It provided that property belonging to persons who had left Croatia after 17 October 1990 was to be requisitioned and controlled by the State. It also authorised local authorities to temporarily accommodate other persons in such property.
In 2000 the applicant recovered possession of his house.
After the applicant had repossessed the house he discovered that most of the movable property in the house had been stolen and that parts of the house had been badly damaged.
In 2001 the applicant brought a civil action in the Slavonski Brod Municipal Court against the State, seeking damages in the amount of 231,284.25 Croatian kuna (HRK) for his stolen and destroyed property.
On 11 June 2008 the Slavonski Brod Municipal Court dismissed the applicant’s action on the grounds that there was no legal basis for holding the State liable in such circumstances. This judgment was upheld by the Slavonski Brod County Court on 22 December 2008, the Supreme Court on 13 April 2011 and by the Constitutional Court on 3 December 2014.
COMPLAINT
The applicant complains under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 that his property was stolen and badly damaged and that the State bears liability for it.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Were the authorities under an obligation, as established in substance under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1, to take measures to ensure the protection of the applicant’s property while third persons accommodated there by the State authorities were using it?
2. If so, did the authorities comply with their positive obligation to protect that property?
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