THIRD SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 72166/01
by Jan ROMER and Agnieszka DMOWSKA-BACULEWSKA
against Poland
The European Court of Human Rights (Third Section), sitting on 8 November 2011 as a Chamber composed of:
Josep Casadevall, President,
Corneliu Bîrsan,
Lech Garlicki,
Alvina Gyulumyan,
Egbert Myjer,
Ineta Ziemele,
Luis López Guerra, judges,
and Santiago Quesada, Section Registrar,
Having regard to the above application lodged on 18 September 2000,
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
THE FACTS
1. The applicants, Mr Jan Romer and Ms Agnieszka Dmowska‑Baculewska, are Polish nationals. They are represented before the Court by Ms M. Nyczka, a lawyer practising in Warsaw. The Polish Government (“the Government”) are represented by their Agent, Mr J. Wołąsiewicz of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
2. The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows.
3. The applicants’ legal predecessors were expropriated, by way of an administrative decision, in 1944.
4. On 8 August 1976 the Warsaw Municipal Office issued decisions which declared that the land belonging to the applicants’ grandfather had become State property on the basis of Article 2 (1) (e) of the Decree on Agrarian Reform of 6 September 1944.
5. In 1990 the applicants requested that the property concerned be restored to them, by way of the decision on expropriation being declared null and void on the grounds of its unlawfulness.
6. In letters to the applicants, dated 21 January 1992, 27 February 1992, 13 April, 16 July, 29 October and 1 December 1993, the Ministry of Agriculture stated that the properties concerned did not fall into the categories of properties to be expropriated under the 1944 Decree and should therefore not have been expropriated. The Ministry referred to the judgment of the Constitutional Court given on 19 September 1990. It was further stated that the owners would be entitled to compensation for damage caused by the expropriation of the land which had afterwards been given to third parties and could not, therefore, be given back to the applicants. The State Treasury, however, did not have sufficient budgetary means to pay such compensation.
7. In the Ministry’s letters of 29 October and 1 December 1993 it was reiterated that if the expropriation decisions had been declared null and void, there would have been no sufficient budgetary means to pay compensation to the applicants.
8. In the letters of 21 January and 27 February 1992, 4 April, 1 and 29 December 1993 it was stated that the lack of budgetary resources hindered a global resolution of cases such as the applicants’ in which persons whose properties had been expropriated in the past by the communist authorities claimed that their properties should be restored to them. The matter should therefore be left to a future statute on re‑privatisation of properties which had been expropriated in the past.
9. On 16 June 1999 the Minister of Agriculture again refused to declare the decision of 8 August 1976 null and void. He observed that after the entry of the 1997 Constitution into force the interpretative rulings of the Constitutional Court had ceased to be valid. Hence, the interpretation of the 1944 Decree developed in the 1990 decision of that court had also lost its validity. As a result, the 1976 decision given in the applicant’s case could not be declared null and void.
10. Having re-examined the case at the applicants’ request, the Minister upheld this refusal on 4 October 1999.
The decisions of 16 June and 4 October 1999 were subsequently quashed by the Supreme Administrative Court on 3 March 2000.
11. The applicants requested the Ministry of Agriculture to re‑examine the case. On 22 April 2008 the Minister quashed the decision given in 1976, finding that it was unlawful.
12. Subsequently the applicants lodged a civil claim with the Warsaw Regional Court, claiming compensation for damage caused by the unlawful expropriation decisions.
13. On 22 October 2010 the Warsaw Regional Court allowed the applicant’s claim and awarded to them compensation in the amount of PLN 36,000,000.
14. The State Treasury appealed.
15. On 16 September 2011 the Warsaw Court of Appeal reduced compensation granted to the applicants by PLN 393,699 and upheld the remainder of the first‑instance judgment.
COMPLAINTS
16. The applicants complained of an infringement of their right to the peaceful enjoyment of their possessions within the meaning of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1.
17. The applicants further complained that the length of the proceedings had been incompatible with the “reasonable time” requirement, laid down in Article 6 § 1 of the Convention
THE LAW
A. Preliminary observations
18. The Court must first address the issue of Ms Agnieszka Hanna Dmowska‑Baculewska’s and Mr Jan Romer’s entitlement to pursue the application originally introduced by Ms Anna Romer and Mr Ignacy Dmowski, who died on 23 June 2004 and 12 June 2001 respectively.
19. In a letter of 30 January 2002 Ms Dmowska-Baculewska declared that she wished to pursue her father’s application before the Court. Mr Jan Romer declared his willingness to pursue his mother’s application before the Court in his letter of 30 September 2004.
20. The Court reiterates that in various cases where an applicant died in the course of the proceedings it has taken into account the statements of the applicant’s heirs or of close members of his family who expressed the wish to pursue the proceedings before the Court (see, Malhous v. the Czech Republic (dec.), no. 33071/96, Krempovskij v. Lithuania (dec.), no. 37193/97, 20 April 1999; M.B. v. Poland, (dec.) no. 34091/96, 8 March 2001; Sildedzis v. Poland, no. 45214/99, 24 May 2005).
21. The Court considers that both Ms Agnieszka Hanna Dmowska‑Baculewska and Mr Jan Romer can claim a legitimate interest in having the proceedings in the applicants’ case being pursued before the Court.
B. Decision to strike the case out of the list of cases
22. On 19 September 2011 the applicants’ representative informed the Court that the applicants wanted to withdraw the application since they were satisfied with the outcome of the domestic proceedings and with the amount of compensation they had received.
23. The Court considers that, in these circumstances, the applicants may be regarded as no longer wishing to pursue their application, within the meaning of Article 37 § 1 (a) of the Convention. Furthermore, in accordance with Article 37 § 1 in fine, the Court finds no special circumstances regarding respect for human rights as defined in the Convention and its Protocols which require the continued examination of the case.
24. In view of the above, it is appropriate to strike the case out of the list.
For these reasons, the Court unanimously
Decides to strike the application out of its list of cases.
Santiago QuesadaJosep Casadevall
RegistrarPresident
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy