Information Note on the Court’s case-law No. 142
June 2011
S.T.S. v. the Netherlands - 277/05
Judgment 7.6.2011 [Section III]
Article 5
Article 5-4
Review of lawfulness of detention
Speediness of review
Inordinate delay by Supreme Court and refusal to entertain appeal against detention once period covered by detention order had expired: violations
Facts – In October 2002 a judge authorised the placement of the applicant, a minor with a history of offending and behavioural difficulties, in custody for treatment. The initial three-month period was extended several times until the judge made an order for a further year’s extension effective from October 2003. In December 2003 a court of appeal reduced that period until 1 May 2004. The applicant appealed in mid-January 2004 to the Supreme Court, which in November 2004 declared his appeal inadmissible for lack of interest, as the period covered by the court of appeal’s order had lapsed in the meantime.
Law – Article 5 § 4
(a) Speediness – Given the need for the court of appeal to gather information from a variety of sources and allow a variety of parties to participate effectively in the proceedings, the period of 63 days it had taken to reach its decision did not, in isolation, raise an issue of speediness. The same could not be said of the proceedings before the Supreme Court, which had given its decision 294 days after the applicant had lodged his appeal on points of law. Such a lapse of time appeared in itself inordinate. Whatever the reasons for the delay, the national judicial authorities had been under an obligation to make the necessary administrative arrangements to ensure that urgent matters were dealt with speedily, particularly when personal liberty was at stake.
Conclusion: violation (unanimously).
(b) Effectiveness – The applicant’s appeal on points of law had been lodged with the Supreme Court just over three and a half months before the expiry of the court of appeal’s six-month authorisation for the applicant’s custodial placement. However, no grounds had been stated why the Supreme Court could not reasonably have been expected to give its decision within that time. Absent such grounds, the lack of a final decision, before the validity of the authorisation for the applicant’s custodial placement had expired, was itself sufficient to deprive the applicant’s appeal on points of law of its practical effectiveness as a preventive or even reparative remedy.
In addition, in declaring the applicant’s appeal on points of law inadmissible as having become devoid of interest, the Supreme Court had deprived it of whatever further effect it might have had. A former detainee might well have a legal interest in the determination of the lawfulness of his detention even after his release, for example, in relation to his “enforceable right to compensation” guaranteed by Article 5 § 5, when it might be necessary to secure a judicial decision which would override any presumption under domestic law that a detention order given by a competent authority was per se lawful. The proceedings for deciding the lawfulness of the applicant’s detention were, therefore, not effective.
Conclusion: violation (unanimously).
Article 41: EUR 2,000 in respect of non-pecuniary damage.
© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights
This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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