Information Note on the Court’s case-law 50
February 2003
Ringvold v. Norway - 34964/97
Judgment 11.2.2003 [Section III]
Article 6
Article 6-2
Presumption of innocence
Award of damages in civil proceedings against person previously acquitted of criminal offence concerning the same facts: no violation
Facts: The applicant was acquitted of sexual abuse of a minor. The court also rejected the victim’s compensation claim. However, she appealed against this refusal to the Supreme Court, which ordered the City Court to take oral evidence and authorised the inclusion in the case-file of documents from the criminal case. The Supreme Court examined the matter under the rules of civil procedure and, after hearing the parties and numerous witnesses, ordered the applicant to pay compensation of 75,000 kroner to the victim. The court observed that “the requirement of evidence for the penal and the civil consequences of an action … is different”. It noted in that respect that, while the evidentiary requirement in the civil proceedings was stricter than the balance of probabilities, given the serious consequences they could have on the defendant’s reputation, it was nonetheless not as strict as that applicable to the establishment of criminal liability. The test was whether, on the balance of probabilities, “it was clearly probable” that the abuse had occurred. Finally, the court stressed that its decision did not undermine the applicant’s acquittal.
Law: Article 6 § 2 – The compensation proceedings were governed by the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure and the claim was described as “civil” in the Supreme Court’s judgment. Thus, the compensation claim was not viewed as a “criminal charge” under domestic law. As to the nature of the proceedings, the claim was to be determined on the basis of principles proper to the civil law of tort. The outcome of the criminal proceedings was not decisive for the civil claim; the compensation issue was to be the object of a separate legal assessment based on criteria and evidentiary standards which in several important respects differed from those that applied to criminal liability. The fact that an act that might give rise to a civil claim was also covered by the objective constituent elements of a criminal offence could not provide a sufficient ground for regarding the defendant as being “charged with a criminal offence”, nor could the fact that evidence from the trial was used to determine the civil law consequences. Otherwise, Article 6 § 2 would have the undesirable effect of pre-empting the victim’s possibilities of claiming compensation, entailing an arbitrary and disproportionate limitation on the right of access to court. Such an extensive interpretation was not supported by either the wording of Article 6 § 2 or any common approach in Contracting States. Consequently, an acquittal should not preclude the establishment of civil liability to pay compensation arising out of the same facts on the basis of a less strict standard of proof. In the present case, the Supreme Court’s ruling, in a separate judgment from the acquittal, did not state expressly or in substance that all the conditions were fulfilled for holding the applicant criminally liable. Furthermore, neither the purpose nor the size of the award of compensation conferred on it the character of a penal sanction for the purposes of Article 6 § 2. Finally, the compensation case was not a direct sequel to the criminal trial and the link between them was not such as to justify extending the scope of Article 6 § 2 to the former.
Conclusion: no violation (unanimously).
© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights
This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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