CEDH · CASELAW;CLIN;ENG — 19 mars 1991

.s3ABFC313 { font-size:10pt } .sD4B5322E { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:justify } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .sA241FE93 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:18pt; text-align:justify; page-break-after:avoid; border-bottom:0.75pt solid #000000; padding-bottom:1pt } .s2EF62ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:12pt } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .s8F2B0B1B { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:12pt } .s9FF10068 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:12pt } .sEB86A30B { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt; page-break-after:avoid } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .s5F48796F { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:justify } .s8B6C6D43 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; border-bottom:1pt solid #000000; padding-bottom:1pt } .sDF790F1E { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s3DC36BA9 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline; color:#0069d6 } Information Note on the Court’s case-law No. March 1991 Cardot v. France (preliminary objections) - 11069/84 Judgment 19.3.1991 Article 35 Article 35-1 Exhaustion of domestic remedies Criminal conviction based partly on statements by former co-defendants, who were examined by investigating judge and each confronted with the accused before him, but not by trial courts: preliminary objection allowed [This summary is extracted from the Court’s official reports (Series A or Reports of Judgments and Decisions). Its formatting and structure may therefore differ from the Case-Law Information Note summaries.] THE GOVERNMENT'S PRELIMINARY OBJECTION (failure to exhaust domestic remedies) Article 35 of the Convention – had to be applied with some degree of flexibility and without excessive formalism – did not, however, require merely that applications should be made to the appropriate domestic courts and that use should be made of remedies designed to challenge decisions already given: it normally required also that complaints intended to be made subsequently at Strasbourg should have been made to those same courts, at least in substance and in compliance with the formal requirements and time-limits laid down in domestic law and, further, that any procedural means which might prevent a breach of the Convention should have been used. Practice in international arbitration appeared to reflect a similar approach, for example the award of 6 March 1956 in the Ambatielos case. In court of first instance applicant in this case had not expressed any wish that evidence should be heard from his former co-defendants, although they had said that he had played major part in organising drug smuggling, nor had he made any application to Court of Appeal for such evidence to be heard – no special reason apparent which could have excused him from calling those witnesses or applying to have them called. Appeal on points of law: only one of the three grounds related to the proceedings in respect of the former co-defendants who had been heard in that capacity at the time – above all, it had not relied on paragraph 3 (d) of Article   6 or even on the general principle in paragraph 1 and had not referred to the statements that the co-defendants had made to investigating judge, so that it had been too vague to draw Court of Cassation's attention to the issue subsequently submitted to Convention institutions, namely failure to hear prosecution witnesses at any stage of court proceedings against applicant. Doubtful, moreover, whether it would have been admissible for applicant, who had not raised point before trial courts, to raise it for first time in Court of Cassation. Conclusion : preliminary objection allowed (six votes to three).   © Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court. Click here for the Case-Law Information Notes