CEDH · CASELAW;COMMUNICATEDCASES;ENG — 4 juin 2020

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .s379BC09C { margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:right } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s10950C61 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify } .s5E1364CA { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s339D85E6 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s665E407E { margin-top:66pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } Communicated on 4 June 2020 Published on 22 June 2020   THIRD SECTION Application no. 42149/17 Viera PETRÍKOVÁ against Slovakia lodged on 6 June 2017 SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE The application concerns the alleged impartiality of one of the Constitutional Court’s judges having ruled on the applicant’s constitutional complaint (Article 6 § 1 of the Convention). The applicant, a former Minister of Justice and currently a judge of the Supreme Court, was in 2010 sued by another judge, J.B., for protection of the latter’s personality rights. On 1 June 2015 and 22 September 2015 respectively, J.B. as well as the applicant lodged constitutional complaints against two different decisions issued within those proceedings. The applicant asked that a judge of the Constitutional Court, Ľ.G., be excluded from both cases for bias. By the Constitutional Court’s decisions of 19   January 2016, Ľ.G. was excluded from sitting in J.B.’s case on account of her own statement concerning her relationship of friendship with J.B. (decision no. III. ÚS 35/2016), but was not excluded from sitting in the applicant’s case (decision no. III. ÚS 36/2016). In the latter decision dismissing the applicant’s objection as unsubstantiated, the Constitutional Court held that the connection between the proceedings on the two constitutional complaints, implicitly stemming from the parties’ position in the proceedings before the general courts, was not a relevant basis for its taking a decision on the objection of bias. The applicant’s constitutional complaint was then dismissed as manifestly ill-founded by a chamber of three judges comprising Ľ.G. (no. II. ÚS 898/2016). QUESTION TO THE PARTIES Did the applicant have a fair hearing by an impartial tribunal, as required by Article 6 § 1 of the Convention (see, mutatis mutandis , Harabin v.   Slovakia , no. 58688/11, § 137, 20 November 2012)?