CEDH · CASELAW;CLIN;ENG — 21 septembre 2010

.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 } .s9FF10068 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom: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. 133 August-September 2010 Polanco Torres and Movilla Polanco v. Spain - 34147/06 Judgment 21.9.2010 [Section III] Article 8 Article 8-1 Respect for private life Press article accusing wife of senior judge on basis of remarks by former accountant of involvement in improper dealings with a company: no violation   Facts – The applicants are respectively the wife and daughter of a senior judge who has died since the events of the case. He was president of a court before which criminal proceedings had been brought against a senior political leader of the region. In 1994 an article in a national daily newspaper, based on a company’s accounts, accused the judge’s wife of involvement in unlawful dealings with that company. The judge and his wife brought proceedings for the protection of their honour against the national newspaper. The district court partly upheld their application and ordered the newspaper to pay them damages. The appellate court and the Supreme Court upheld that judgment. In 2006, however, the Constitutional Court upheld an amparo appeal lodged by the newspaper and quashed the judgments of the courts below. Law – Article 8: Article 8 was applicable because the allegations in the newspaper article were serious enough to impugn the personal integrity of the persons concerned. The article concerned a subject of general interest for its Spanish readers, as one of the applicants was referred to as the wife of a senior judge, who was precisely identified, and in her denial she mentioned a “manoeuvre” by the highest political leader in the region. The article had the characteristics of a neutral report, containing on the one hand the statements of the former accountant and on the other a denial by the judge’s wife. The author of the article had made use of the effective possibility of verifying the information by contacting the company’s former accountant. Moreover, before publishing the article, he had contacted the judge’s wife to give her the opportunity to comment on the information at issue. As the Constitutional Court had rightly observed, that showed that the journalist had fulfilled his obligation of diligence. In addition, the publication of an article could not be prevented simply because the persons concerned denied the allegations therein. As to whether the sources had been reliable, as the Constitutional Court had found, the accountant’s dismissal and the criminal proceedings against him had not called into question the reliability of his statements, and the question of the lawfulness of the means by which the information had been obtained was not relevant in determining whether the honour of the persons concerned had been damaged. Accordingly, it had been reasonable for the journalist to rely on the sources at his disposal and he had taken sufficient measures to verify the allegations contained in his article. The Constitutional Court had put forward sufficient grounds in finding that the national newspaper’s right to impart information had to be given more weight than the applicants’ right to the protection of their reputation. Accordingly, there was no reason to conclude, in the balancing of the competing interests, that the Constitutional Court had overstepped its margin of appreciation. Conclusion : no violation (six votes to one).   © 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