CYIL 2012

THE CZECH REPUBLIC AND THE EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN 2011 One of the most significant rulings rendered by the Court in 2011 is the case of Ťupa v the Czech Republic . 22 The domestic courts decided that Mr Ťupa needed to be admitted to a psychiatric hospital as he was a danger to himself. The courts based that decision on interviews carried out by a senior court clerk with both a doctor from the psychiatric hospital and with Mr Ťupa himself. The applicant complained that his right to liberty had been violated because his confinement had not been justified. The Court noted that the decision to detain the applicant, who had no history of violence in a psychiatric hospital, against his will was based solely on one document – the record of the interview. The Court observed that this was not an emergency case and that the domestic courts examined neither the general practitioner nor provided any reasons why they considered the applicant to be dangerous to himself. They simply stated that this was the case, but no doctor expressed any view in this regard. Nor had any less severe measures than detention in a psychiatric hospital been envisaged and deemed inadequate. The ECtHR therefore held that the domestic courts had failed to subject Mr Ťupa’s detention in psychiatric care to thorough scrutiny, in violation of Article 5 § 1 (right to liberty and security). 7. Are there conflicting remedies? All three judgments rendered in October 2011 involved Article 6. 23 In all these cases the applicants alleged that the refusal by the Constitutional Court to examine their constitutional complaints on the merits had entailed a violation of their right of access to a court (Article 6 paragraph 1 of the Convention). The ECtHR followed its reasoning in the case of Adamíček 24 and concluded that the Convention was violated. The first judgment was delivered in the case of Tieze and Semeráková. 25 T he applicants filed a complaint to the Constitutional Court along with lodging an appeal on points of laws before the Supreme Court. The Constitutional Court rejected the complaints for prematureness because of ongoing legal proceedings before the Supreme Court. Afterwards the Supreme Court declared the appeals inadmissible and therefore the applicants resorted to the Constitutional Court again. However, the Constitutional Court rejected the complaints for lateness and stated that the period for raising the complaint had expired sixty days after the Regional Court issued its judgment on appeal. The Constitutional Court disregarded the proceedings before the Supreme Court, deciding that the applicants had not met the requirements for a valid appeal on points of law. Subsequently, the applicants turned to the ECtHR and alleged the infringement of the right of access to a court. The Strasbourg Court had already evaluated the legal framework concerning the relationship between 22 Ťupa v the Czech Republic App no 39822/07 (ECHR, May 2011). 23 Subject-matter of violation judgments accessed 27 May 2012, Table of violations 1959-2011, accessed 27 May 2012. 24 Adamíček v the Czech Republic App no 35836/05 (ECHR, October 2010). 25 Tieze and Semerakova v the Czech Republic App no 26908/09, 30809/10 (ECHR, October 2011).

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