Communicated on 12 October 2020
Published on 2 November 2020
THIRD SECTION
Application no. 22321/19
Thomas WICK
against Germany
lodged on 18 April 2019
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns the applicant’s access to a judicial review of the enhanced security regime during his detention and repeated prison transfers. Since March 2015 the applicant has been transferred twelve times to different prisons, including the latest transfers from Weiterstadt (19 April 2017) to Lübeck (26 July 2017) and then to Bruchsal prison (17 October 2017).
On 6 September 2017 the Darmstadt Regional Court, which had jurisdiction over Weiterstadt prison, rejected the applicant’s complaint about the enhanced security regime. Without deciding on the merits, it found that, due to a permanent transfer to Lübeck prison, the complaint had lost its object because the applicant was no longer subject to any measures in Weiterstadt prison. The Frankfurt Court of Appeal rejected the applicant’s appeal as inadmissible without providing reasons.
On 10 October 2017 the Lübeck Regional Court, which had jurisdiction over Lübeck prison, rejected the applicant’s complaints about the enhanced security regime and the prison transfer. Without deciding on the merits, it found that, due to the temporary nature of the transfer to Lübeck prison, the Lübeck prison authorities were the wrong respondents and the applicant should have directed his complaints against Weiterstadt prison. The conflicting decision of the Darmstadt Regional Court was the result of wrong information from Weiterstadt prison. The Schleswig-Holstein Court of Appeal rejected the applicant’s appeals as inadmissible because the applicant had been transferred from Lübeck to Bruchsal prior to the filing of his appeals.
On 18 December 2017 the Darmstadt Regional Court dismissed the applicant’s request for interim measures to stop his envisaged transfer from Lübeck to Bruchsal and ultimately, after he had been transferred to Bruchsal, to be returned to Lübeck. It found that the Weiterstadt prison authorities either no longer had the competence to take any decisions because the applicant’s transfer to Lübeck prison had to be considered a long-term transfer or - assuming that they still had the competence - they could not oblige Lübeck prison to detain the applicant because Lübeck was in another Land of Germany.
The applicant complains under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention that the conduct of the authorities prevented him from having access to court. The domestic courts were either not given the opportunity to decide on the merits or they did not decide with the required swiftness.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Was Article 6 § 1 of the Convention under its civil head applicable to the proceedings in the present case?
2. Has the applicant exhausted all effective domestic remedies, as required by Article 35 § 1 of the Convention? Did the applicant dispose of other remedies to complain about a measure in prison or a transfer? Had the applicant the possibility to obtain retrospectively a declaratory decision on the legality of a transfer or of a measure of the prison authorities?
3. If so, did the applicant have access to a court for the determination of his civil rights and obligations, in accordance with Article 6 § 1 of the Convention?
What were the rules of procedure and the available remedies when, pending proceedings, the applicant was transferred to a prison within the jurisdiction of a different court? In particular, could the so-far competent court refer the proceedings to the court that had jurisdiction over the prison where the applicant had been transferred?
4. The Government are invited to provide the Court with the prison authorities’ orders concerning the transfers from Weiterstadt (19 April 2017) to Lübeck (26 July 2017) and then to Bruchsal prison (17 October 2017), and the applicant’s request for interim measures resulting in the decision of the Darmstadt Regional Court of 18 December 2017.
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