CEDH · CASELAW;CLIN;ENG — 4 juin 2013

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Romania - 46878/06 Judgment 4.6.2013 [Section III] Article 6 Article 6-2 Presumption of innocence Reasoning of civil courts based to decisive extent on comments made by prosecutor as to guilt when discontinuing criminal proceedings on technical grounds: violation   Facts – In 2001 the commercial company which employed the applicant as its executive director lodged a criminal complaint, accusing him of having issued forged documents to obtain the reimbursement of expenses. In 2003 it suspended his employment contract pending the outcome of those criminal proceedings. In 2005 the prosecutor’s office decided to discontinue the proceedings on the ground that the limitation period had expired. At the same time, it concluded that the case file clearly indicated that the applicant had used forged documents to obtain the reimbursement of expenses and that his use of money advanced by the company other than for the intended purpose constituted the offences of falsification of documents and abuse of office. On the basis of the above conclusions, the employer lifted the suspension of the applicant’s employment contract but refused to pay his salary for the period he had been suspended, and then dismissed him. The applicant challenged those two decisions before the domestic courts, but without success. Law – Article 6 § 2: The question was whether the civil courts had acted in such a way or used such language in their reasoning as to cast doubts on the applicant’s innocence and thus infringed the principle of the presumption of innocence. Although a mere reference to the content of a prosecutor’s decision to discontinue proceedings could not in itself suffice to conclude that the individual concerned was criminally responsible for the offence with which he had been charged, repetition without any qualification or reservation could leave room for doubt as to his innocence if other arguments were not added by the civil courts. In the instant case, the domestic courts quoted extensively from the prosecutor’s 2005 decision with regard to whether the applicant had committed the offences with which he was accused, without seeking to depart from that decision’s findings. Thy the applicant for failing to use the remedies set out in the Code of Criminal Procedure “to have his innocence established” or “have set aside the finding of guilt against him”. Yet those provisions pertained to the criminal sphere and clearly concerned a person’s criminal responsibility. In so doing, the civil courts, which had full jurisdiction, had not used their powers to establish the facts and the applicant’s possible disciplinary liability in terms corresponding exclusively to the civil sphere. In addition, in the proceedings on the applicant’s dismissal, the civil courts had stressed the fact that expiry of the limitation period “did not mean that a guilty verdict was eliminated, but only prevented application of a criminal sanction”. Yet such a statement as to guilt could easily lead the reader to conclude that, had the limitation period not expired, the applicant would necessarily have been convicted of the charges against him. Thus, despite the civil courts’ references to the Labour Code, it remained the case that they had employed language which overstepped the bounds of the civil forum, thereby casting doubt on the applicant’s innocence. In conclusion, the civil courts’ use of the prosecutor’s decision to close the criminal proceedings against the applicant in order to dismiss his actions in respect of his employment relationship justified the extension of the scope of Article 6 §   2 to the two sets of civil proceedings. The civil courts’ decisive reliance on the decision to discontinue the criminal proceedings, and the terminology they used were incompatible with the presumption of innocence. The Government’s preliminary objection ratione materiae was accordingly dismissed. Conclusion : violation (five votes to two). Article 41: EUR 3,500 in respect of non-pecuniary damage; claim in respect of pecuniary damage dismissed.   © 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