Information Note on the Court’s case-law No. 107
April 2008
Wasserman v. Russia (no. 2) - 21071/05
Judgment 10.4.2008 [Section I]
Article 13
Effective remedy
Proceedings offering no speedy redress and an insufficient amount of damages for the length of enforcement proceedings: violation
Facts: The applicant had brought a previous application before the Court (application no. 15021/02) concerning the non-enforcement of a judgment debt in his favour. In its Chamber judgment of 18 November 2004 the Court held unanimously that there had been a violation of Article 6 § 1 (right of access to a court) and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (protection of property). The present case concerned the applicant’s complaint about the continued non-enforcement of the same judgment and the absence of an effective domestic remedy. He had instituted civil proceedings claiming compensation for non-pecuniary damage caused by the protracted non-enforcement of the judgment and was eventually awarded RUB 8,000 (less than EUR 250).
Law
Preliminary objection –Competence ratione materiae: The Government had claimed, firstly, that the Court was not competent to examine the case under Article 46 § 2 because the Committee of Ministers had not yet completed the execution of the Chamber judgment of 18 November 2004. The Court acknowledged that it had no jurisdiction to review the measures adopted by the Russian authorities but considered that it could, nevertheless, take stock of subsequent factual developments. It observed that the applicant’s complaints concerned a further period during which the judgment in his favour had also remained unenforced so that it did in fact have competence to examine them.
Merits: The Court noted that Russian law did not determine the procedure for complaints concerning the excessive length of enforcement proceedings. In the applicant’s case, he had brought an action for compensation for damage incurred by the prolonged non-enforcement of a judgment in his favour, but those proceedings had exceeded two-and-a-half years and did not therefore meet the requirement of speediness necessary for a remedy to be “effective” within the meaning of Article 13. Moreover, the domestic courts’ award to the applicant in respect of non-pecuniary damage was manifestly unreasonable in the light of the Court’s case-law in similar cases.
Conclusion: violation (unanimously).
The Court further found violations of the applicant’s rights under Article 6 § 1 (right of access to court) and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (protection of property).
Article 41: EUR 373 for pecuniary damage and EUR 4,000 for non-pecuniary damage.
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This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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