Communicated on 15 October 2018
FOURTH SECTION
Application no. 82968/17
Galina ŠEIKO
against Lithuania
lodged on 5 December 2017
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The applicant, Ms Galina Šeiko, is a Lithuanian national, who was born in 1950 and lives in Kretinga.
A. The circumstances of the case
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
On an unspecified date, the applicant was found guilty in a criminal case against her and was ordered to pay 5,908.24 euros (EUR) in respect of pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage.
On 6 December 2016 the bailiff sent the applicant a letter asking her to pay the money. The applicant did not pay and on 22 December 2016 her plot of land of 0.06 hectares was seized. A letter regarding the recovery of debt was also sent to the Kretinga division of the State Social Insurance Fund Board because the applicant was receiving old‑age pension. It appears that the applicant is receiving EUR 101.2 in pension every month and that EUR 20.24 is being recovered from her each month.
In January 2017 the applicant asked the bailiff to terminate the recovery of debt from her pension and to annul the seizure of her land. The bailiff replied on 27 January 2017 that he could not satisfy her request because the interests of the victim would be affected. The applicant then asked the bailiff to allow her to sell the seized plot of land to a seller of her choice. The bailiff agreed. However, she failed to produce the valuation report of the plot of land and the bailiff stated that he would announce a public auction. On 9 February 2017 the bailiff decided not to terminate the recovery of debt and not to annul the seizure of the plot of land and transferred the case together with the applicant’s complaint to a court.
On 7 March 2017 the Kretinga District Court stated that the Code of Civil Procedure provided that it was not allowed to recover the assets from an amount not exceeding the minimum monthly wage, which was EUR 380. The applicant was receiving her pension and recovery of debt was possible. If the allowance did not exceed minimum monthly wage, then only twenty per cent could be recovered every month. The amount recovered from the applicant’s pension did not exceed twenty per cent. Domestic law also provided that if the amount to be recovered was intended to cover damage for a criminal offence, and if a person received less than minimum monthly wage, fifty per cent from the payments he or she had received could be recovered. The domestic law defined the amounts from which recovery was not possible, but the applicant’s allowance was not among those amounts. The applicant’s complaint against the bailiff was thus dismissed.
The applicant submitted a separate complaint. On 8 June 2018 the Klaipėda Regional Court upheld the first-instance decision. The court stated that the bailiff had ordered the recovery of the debt from the applicant’s pension, which was lower than a minimum monthly wage. Old-age pension was not among the amounts from which recovery could not be made, thus the bailiff had a right to order the recovery of the debt.
The applicant submitted an appeal on points of law. On 13 September 2017 the Supreme Court decided that it did not raise important legal issues and refused to accept it.
B. Relevant domestic law
Article 668 § 1 of the Code of Civil Procedure (the CCP) provides that recovery of assets cannot be directed against household supplies, economy, labour, study items or other property of a natural person that is crucial for the subsistence of him or her or his or her family, work or studies. Also, recovery cannot be directed against amounts lower than the minimum monthly wage, necessary items for children and disabled persons.
Article 688 § 1 of the CCP provides that recovery of a debt can be directed against the debtor’s money and other property that is with other persons, as well as to money and other property that belongs to a debtor from other persons.
Article 736 § 1 of the CCP provides that recovery of debt can be directed against a person’s salary and similar payments lower that a minimum monthly wage in accordance with execution documents until all the relevant amounts are recovered: (1) if damage is done to someone’s health or to life of the main supporter of a family – amounts of up to fifty per cent can be recovered; (2) as regards any other damage – amounts of up to twenty per cent can be recovered; (3) if there are several writs of execution ‑ amounts of up to fifty per cent can be recovered.
Article 739 of the CCP provides that it cannot be recovered from: (1) compensation for normal wear and tear of the employee’s tools and other compensations paid as a result of loss of earnings in normal conditions; (2) from amounts paid to the employee for a business trip or amounts paid to the employee who is moved elsewhere, accepted to a job and sent to work in other places; (3) amounts paid as maternity, paternity and child care allowances; (4) allowances paid to children in accordance with the Law on Children Allowances; (5) burial allowance; (6) amounts paid in accordance with the Law on Allowance Pensions and the Law on Targeted compensations and other allowances and compensations paid from State or municipalities’ budget for social care of indigent persons; (7) various orphans’ pensions; (8) severance payments.
COMPLAINT
The applicant complains under Article 3 of the Convention that the recovery of damages from her old-age pension, which constitutes one fifth of it, was unlawful.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Does the recovery of compensation awarded from the applicant by the domestic courts in respect of pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage, effected from her old-age pension, amount to an interference with the applicant’s right for respect for her possessions, as guaranteed by Article 1 of Protocol No. 1? If so, was this interference lawful? In the affirmative, did that interference at issue impose an excessive individual burden on the applicant (see Immobiliare Saffi v. Italy, [GC], no. 22774/93, § 59, ECHR 1999-V)?
2. Alternatively, did the measure in question amount to a control of use of property applied in the general interest, and was it necessary to secure the payment of “other contributions”, within the meaning of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention?
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