CEDH · CASELAW;CLIN;ENG — 11 décembre 2025

.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 } .s65B66A85 { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt } .s97EB40D9 { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:14pt; page-break-after:avoid } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .s5F48796F { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:justify } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s3DC36BA9 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline; color:#0069d6 } .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 } Legal summary December 2025 Diaco and Lenchi v. Italy - 15587/10, 32536/10 and 18531/14 Judgment 11.12.2025 [Section I] Article 46 Article 46-2 Execution of judgment General measures Respondent State required to identify various causes of structural deficiencies resulting in authorities’ delay in paying lawyers legal-aid fees awarded by means of judicial decision, and to provide solutions   Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 Article 1 para. 1 of Protocol No. 1 Peaceful enjoyment of possessions Failure of authorities to enforce judicial decisions to pay legal-aid fees to applicant lawyers within reasonable time: violation Facts   – The two applicants, who are lawyers, represented legal-aid recipients. For their services, they obtained 44   payment decisions ( decreti di pagamento ) from the relevant courts setting the amount of their fees. No objections were made by any of the parties and so, upon expiry of the statutory 30‑day time-limit, those decisions became final. Upon receiving authorisation from the court registry, the applicants submitted their invoices for payment. When the sums due were not paid, the applicants applied to the competent authorities to obtain payment. All the payment decisions were eventually enforced within periods ranging from one year and one month to four years and two months. Before the Court, the applicants complained of the delay in the payment of the sums due to them. Law – Article   1 of Protocol No.   1: (1) Applicability – Under domestic law, payment decisions setting the fees payable by the State to lawyers defending legal-aid recipients were official declarations authorising payment, acknowledging the right of those lawyers to the performance of an obligation by the State. By means of the payment decision, the court certified the existence of a claim and, at the same time, established the amount thereof. The decision was thus an instrument that guaranteed the payment of the money owed. Furthermore, it was proof of a sufficiently established and payable debt for the purposes of applying for a payment order ( decreto ingiuntivo ). In addition, it was clear from the case-law of the Court of Cassation that “anyone who [sought] payment of fees for services rendered to an individual who [had] been granted legal aid [had] a genuine personal right”. That right was acknowledged by the payment decision, which was judicial in nature. In the present case, the applicants’ clients had been granted legal aid by final decisions either of the competent court in criminal proceedings or of the Bar Council in civil proceedings. Through payment decisions issued on various dates, the courts had both determined the applicants’ right to the corresponding fees and established the amount thereof. Those decisions, which were subject to appeal before the civil courts within a statutory time-limit, had not been challenged either by the applicants or by the authorities. Accordingly, in the light of the Court’s case-law and the relevant domestic law, it had to be concluded that the applicants had acquired a right representing a “proprietary interest” which had sufficient basis in domestic law to be covered by the notion of “possessions” within the meaning of Article   1 of Protocol No.   1 to the Convention. (2) Merits – The non-enforcement of a decision acknowledging right of property constituted an interference for the purposes of the first sentence of the first paragraph of Article   1 of Protocol No.   1. In order to determine whether a fair balance had been struck between the demands of the general interest and the requirements of the protection of the applicants’ right to the peaceful enjoyment of their possessions, the Court was called upon to examine whether the delay in paying the legal-aid fees due to the applicants had not placed a disproportionate and excessive burden on them. (a) Period to be taken into account – The interference complained of lay in the failure of the competent authorities to ensure the effectiveness of the right they had conferred on the applicants by means of those decisions, first by sending them to the parties, then by authorising the applicants to submit their invoices and, lastly, by paying them the sums due. In addition, no invoice could be submitted until an administrative phase of the process had been completed   – and potentially a judicial phase too   –, which depended exclusively on the administrative authorities. The Court therefore considered that the starting-point for the calculation of the time-limit had to be the date on which the payment decision had been deposited in the domestic court’s registry, that being the moment when the judicial authorities had acknowledged the existence of debts to the applicants. (b) Reasonableness of the time taken to pay the sums set in the payment decisions – The time taken to enforce the payment decisions ranged from one year and one month to four years and two months, periods which appeared prima facie unreasonable. As regards the criterion based on the complexity of the proceedings, the steps to be taken by the authorities had not been particularly complex, since they had involved sending the payment decisions to the parties, authorising the lawyers to submit their invoices and paying the sums in question. As to the applicants’ conduct, in the absence of any evidence that they had been responsible for the delay, account had to be taken of the full period prior to the submission of their invoices, with the exception of the statutory 30   days for objecting to the payment decisions. Lastly, regarding what was at stake in the dispute, special diligence was required in paying legal-aid fees to lawyers, not only because of the fundamental part lawyers played in a democratic society, but also in view of the essential role of legal aid in ensuring access to justice and the effectiveness of the rights guaranteed by the Convention. Accordingly, while the Court could understand that a certain amount of time might be needed to enforce payment decisions, that period should not, save in exceptional circumstances, exceed a total of one year   – excluding the objection period   – i.e., in principle, six months between the time the decisions were deposited and the time the lawyers were authorised to submit their invoice, and six months between the time the invoice was sent and the time the payment was made. In the instant case, the amount of time that had elapsed between the depositing of the payment decisions in the registry and payment of the sums due, after deducting the objection period, ranged from a little over one year to four years and one month. The Government had not put forward any convincing explanation for the delays. In the light of the foregoing, the Court found that the authorities’ failure to process the applicants’ claims and to enforce the payment decisions within a reasonable time had placed an excessive burden on the applicants. Conclusion : violation (unanimously). Article   46: The Court was called upon to rule for the first time on the question of a delay in the payment of legal-aid fees awarded to lawyers by means of a judicial decision. The delays in the present case did not appear to be isolated incidents. There were indications of certain deficiencies in the administration of the procedures for the discharge of the legal-aid awards. The Court therefore considered that the national authorities, under the supervision of the Committee of Ministers, should adopt the general measures necessary to verify, in particular with the aid of statistical data, the existence of systemic deficiencies, at national level or in specific court-of-appeal districts, to determine the various causes of any deficiencies observed and, where appropriate, to identify and adopt general measures capable of resolving those problems and preventing similar violations in the future. Article   41: EUR   7,200 to the first applicant and EUR   1,000 to the second applicant in respect of non‑pecuniary damage. (See Ramadhi and Others v.   Albania , 38222/02, 13   November 2007, Legal Summary ; Viaşu v.   Romania , 75951/01, 9   December 2008, Legal Summary )   © Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court. To access legal summaries in English or French click here . For non-official translations into other languages click here .