CEDH · CASELAW;CLIN;ENG — 4 octobre 2011

.s3ABFC313 { font-size:10pt } .sEB86A30B { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt; page-break-after:avoid } .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 } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .s5F48796F { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:justify } .s5CB9E8AB { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:justify; 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. 145 October 2011 Nassau Verzekering Maatschappij N.V. v. the Netherlands (dec.) - 57602/09 Decision 4.10.2011 [Section III] Article 34 Victim Applicant purporting to have acquired Convention claim under a deed of assignment: absence of victim status   Facts – The applicant company insured a firm of brokers against professional-liability claims. The brokers were sued by a third party and ordered to pay damages. Their appeal against that order was dismissed as being out of time, allegedly as a result of an oversight by court bailiffs, and the applicant company was obliged to pay the damages under the terms of the insurance policy. The brokers then signed a deed assigning to the applicant company any claims they might have against the Netherlands State under Article   6 of the Convention as a result of their being denied access to the appeal court by the bailiffs’ oversight. The European Court examined as a preliminary issue the question whether the applicant company had thereby acquired “victim” status. Law – Article 34: Under the Court’s established case-law, the concept of “victim” had to be interpreted autonomously and irrespective of domestic concepts such as those concerning an interest or capacity to act. In addition, in order to claim “victim” status, applicants had to show a sufficiently direct link between them and the harm they considered they had sustained on account of the alleged violation. There were examples in the Court’s case-law of applicants having been accorded standing despite not having themselves been victims of the alleged violation. These included the heirs and next-of-kin of deceased applicants, and company shareholders where it was impossible for the company to apply to the Convention institutions through its statutory organs. The present case was, however, different. The applicant company was not itself a party to the impugned domestic proceedings and had not derived vicarious “victim” status from kinship, inheritance, or institutional links to the brokers, or from any other form of succession. Instead, it had sought to obtain by a deed of assignment – a contract under domestic civil law – the right to lodge an application under the Convention with the Court. The right of individual petition vouchsafed by Article   34 was not a proprietary right. Nor was it transferable as if it were. Whatever the transaction’s validity in terms of domestic law, it would be out of keeping with the nature of the Convention as an instrument protecting basic human rights and the Court itself as its guardian to allow the status of applicant to be transferred at will. Conclusion : inadmissible (incompatible ratione personae ).   © 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