Information Note on the Court’s case-law No.
February 1994
Stanford v. Royaume-Uni - 16757/90
Judgment 23.2.1994
Article 6
Article 6-1
Fair hearing
Public hearing
Oral hearing
Alleged inability of the accused to hear some of the evidence given in court: no violation
[This summary is extracted from the Court’s official reports (Series A or Reports of Judgments and Decisions). Its formatting and structure may therefore differ from the Case-Law Information Note summaries.]
Article 6 of the Convention
Not in dispute that Article 6 guarantees the right to participate effectively in a criminal trial - this includes not only the right to be present but also to hear and follow the proceedings - both implicit in the notion of an adversarial procedure and derivable from sub-paragraphs (c), (d) and (e) of Article 6 § 3.
Neither the applicant nor his legal representatives sought to bring his hearing difficulties to the attention of the trial judge - counsel chose for tactical reasons to remain silent about the problem and there was nothing to indicate that the applicant disagreed with this decision. The Contracting States cannot be held responsible for the actions of an accused's lawyer unless a failure to provide effective representation is manifest or sufficiently brought to their attention. Apart from a minimal loss of sound due to a glass screen on the dock, expert reports showed that the acoustic levels in the courtroom were satisfactory. He was ably represented by counsel who had every opportunity to discuss with him any points which were not in the witness statements.
Court of Appeal could not be expected to correct a shortcoming which had not been raised before the trial judge.
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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