Information Note on the Court’s case-law No. 99
July 2007
Zaicevs v. Latvia - 65022/01
Judgment 31.7.2007 [Section III]
Article 6
Article 6-1
Criminal charge
Gravity of an order for three days’ administrative detention: article 6 § 1 applicable
Article 2 of Protocol No. 7
No means of challenging an order for administrative detention for contempt of court: violation
Facts: The applicant accompanied a woman he was representing to the courthouse to obtain a copy of the record of a hearing held in her civil case. However, Judge M.J., who had examined the case, refused to give them the document concerned and ordered them to leave her office. She reported the applicant for a regulatory offence and sent an explanatory note to Judge K.S., interim president of the court. Shortly thereafter a similar written account was presented by a member of the court’s registry who had witnessed the incident. The following day Judge K.S. ordered the applicant to be summoned, to determine whether he had been guilty of contempt of court. However, the applicant did not find out about this until a few days later, when he went to the same court to represent somebody else. He immediately went to see Judge K.S. and asked to see and make copies of the documents in the case file, to help him prepare his defence. The request was refused at first, then accepted the following day. Judge A.P. examined the merits of the accusation against the applicant, who requested – in vain – that the judge who had reported him be summoned to the hearing. The applicant was sentenced to three days' administrative detention for contempt of court, an offence under the Code of Regulatory Offences. Judge A.P. considered that the applicant’s guilt was sufficiently established by the written explanations of judge M.J. and the registry staff member who had witnessed the incident.
Law: Article 6 § 1 – Applicability – As the maximum penalty applicable was fifteen days’ imprisonment and the applicant had actually been sentenced to three days, the penalty was sufficiently serious to place the offence in the criminal sphere. Furthermore, the two highest courts in the respondent State had expressly acknowledged that administrative detention could be equated with a criminal penalty.
Conclusion: Article 6 was applicable in this case (unanimously).
Compliance – The applicant had elected to forgo his right to be assisted by a lawyer. No grounds for questioning the subjective or objective impartiality of judge A.P., who had convicted him, had been adduced. Judge K.S. had eventually allowed the applicant to consult his file and make photocopies free of charge two days before the hearing. This would have given him enough time to prepare his defence. Concerning the judge’s refusal to summon her colleague and allow the applicant to question her, the colleague concerned had drafted a report describing the events which had led to the applicant’s conviction. The report in question had not been the only item of evidence at the origin of the conviction. In order to exercise the right to question witnesses, the accused must clearly request it, which he had not done in this case. All things considered, the disputed proceedings could not be said to have been unfair.
Conclusion: no violation (unanimously).
Article 2 of Protocol No. 7 – An offence for which imprisonment is the principal penalty prescribed by law could not be qualified as minor within the meaning of Article 2 § 2 of Protocol No. 7.
Conclusion: violation (unanimously).
Article 41 – EUR 1,000 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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