SECOND SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 46551/12
Attila TORMA
against Hungary
The European Court of Human Rights (Second Section), sitting on 9 July 2013 as a Committee composed of:
Peer Lorenzen, President,
András Sajó,
Nebojša Vučinić, judges,
and Attila Nalbant, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to the above application lodged on 17 July 2012,
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
THE FACTS
The applicant, Mr Attila Torma, is a Hungarian national, who was born in 1937 and lives in Nagykovácsi. He was represented before the Court by Mr D. Karsai, a lawyer practising in Budapest.
A. The circumstances of the case
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
On 13 October 2005 the applicant filed an action for division of matrimonial property.
The first hearing scheduled for 15 May 2006 was adjourned at the applicant’s request. At the next hearing, on 28 June 2006 the applicant’s counsel submitted that he could not make a statement on the applicant’s behalf and requested an extension of the relevant time-limit until 17 July 2006. The hearings scheduled for 13 November 2006 and 26 March 2007 had to be adjourned because the applicant was abroad; and the next hearing took place on 18 May 2007.
A motion for bias filed by the applicant, submitted on 12 October 2007, was rejected on 23 January 2008. On 22 October 2008 the court ordered the parties to comment on an expert opinion in 15 days; however, the applicant did so only on 13 March 2009. On 16 March 2009 he was ordered to specify his claims in 15 days; however, he did so only on 11 September 2009.
A first judgment was given by the Pest County Regional Court on 21 October 2009. On 19 October 2010 the Budapest Court of Appeal upheld this judgment. This decision was served on 18 November 2010.
On 20 December 2010, the applicant filed a request for reopening of the case, claiming negligence of his counsels in submitting evidence on his behalf. On 18 February 2011 the Regional Court ordered him to supplement his request in accordance with the law. Furthermore, he was informed that he was free to consult the case file to verify which evidence had not been submitted; and he was ordered to submit the missing evidence within eight days and to specify the reasons for which it had not been submitted in the principal proceedings.
On 14 April 2011 the applicant supplemented his request for reopening. At the hearing of 26 October 2011 the judge in charge informed the parties that, since new evidence had emerged, the court would re-hear the case on the merits. Subsequently, the court heard the applicant in person who then admitted that he had in fact been in the possession of the impugned piece of evidence already during the principal proceedings. At the end of the hearing, the applicant was informed that there was no ground for reopening unless he proved that he was not at fault in not submitting the evidence in his favour in the principal proceedings.
In its judgment of 8 February 2012 the Regional Court upheld the judgment of 21 October 2009. It held, inter alia, that it was the applicant’s own fault that he had not submitted the piece of evidence in question in the principal proceedings, therefore the conditions for reopening set out in section 260(2) of the Code of Civil Procedure were not met. The applicant did not appeal.
COMPLAINTS
The applicant complained under Article 6 of the Convention about the length of the proceedings and under Article 13 about the absence of an effective domestic remedy in this respect.
THE LAW
The applicant complained that the proceedings lasted an unreasonably long time, in breach of the “reasonable time” requirement of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention.
The Government contested this view, arguing that the proceedings on the merits of the case had ended on 18 November 2010 with the service of the Court of Appeal’s decision, whereas the application was introduced only on 17 July 2012, that is, more than six months later. Moreover, they asserted that the length of the case had not been unreasonable, especially since the entire re-opening phase had been futile. The applicant contested these arguments.
The Court considers that it is not necessary to examine the issue of the six-month time-limit, because this complaint is in any event inadmissible for the following reasons. It notes that the proceedings started on 13 October 2005 and ended 8 February 2012 with the Regional Court’s decision on re-opening. The case thus lasted some six years and four months. However, between 20 December 2010 and 8 February 2012 the subject matter of the dispute was no more than re-opening on account of allegedly new evidence, which turned out to be withheld by the applicant himself. For the Court, the duration of these entirely futile proceedings cannot be imputed to the State. Moreover, the remaining period of approximately five year and one month, for the two levels of jurisdiction, also contained several periods in which the applicant caused certain delays, in particular between 15 May and 17 July 2006, 13 November 2006 and 18 May 2007, 12 October 2007 and 23 January 2008, 22 October 2008 and 13 March 2009 as well as 16 March and 11 September 2009. In these circumstances, the Court is satisfied that, in the absence of any particular periods of inactivity attributable to the authorities, the overall length of the proceedings did not exceed a “reasonable time”, within the meaning of Article 6 § 1. It follows that this part of the application is manifestly ill-founded within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 (a) and must be rejected, pursuant to Article 35 § 4 of the Convention.
The applicant also complained that no effective remedy was available to him concerning the length of the proceedings, in breach of Article 13 of the Convention. The Government contested this view, pointing out that the applicant could have availed himself of an “objection” under section 114/A of the Code of Civil Procedure.
The Court notes that the applicant’s complaint about the length of the proceedings is manifestly ill-founded (see above). In these circumstances, he does not have an “arguable claim” of a violation of his Article 6 rights to entitle him to a remedy before a national authority in order to have his claim decided and, if appropriate, to obtain redress (cf. Silver and Others v. the United Kingdom, 25 March 1983, § 113, Series A no. 61). It follows that this part of the application is likewise manifestly ill-founded within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 (a) and must be rejected, pursuant to Article 35 § 4 of the Convention.
For these reasons, the Court unanimously
Declares the application inadmissible.
Atilla NalbantPeer Lorenzen
Acting Deputy RegistrarPresident
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy