Information Note on the Court’s case-law 11
October 1999
Tammer v. Estonia (dec.) - 41205/98
Decision 19.10.1999 [Section I]
Article 10
Article 10-1
Freedom of expression
Conviction of journalist for using insulting words while referring to a well-know politician’s wife: admissible
The applicant, a journalist by profession, was convicted of having insulted the wife of a prominent politician when interviewing another journalist with the help of whom she had written her memoirs but who had allegedly published them without her consent. A fine of 220 EEK was imposed. The woman had been the politician’s assistant when he was Prime Minister and later Minister of the Interior, and had had his child while he was still married to his first wife. She admitted in her memoirs that she had privileged her career, leaving their child’s upbringing to her parents, and looked back on her premarital relationship with her husband and the detrimental effects it had had on his former marriage. The applicant used two Estonian words in the interview which described her as being a “marriage breaker” and an unfit and careless mother. His appeals, notably to the Supreme Court, were dismissed.
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This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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