ENE v. ROMANIA

ECLIECLI:CE:ECHR:2023:0110DEC005030316
CourtFourth Section Committee (European Court of Human Rights)
Date10 January 2023
Application Number50303/16
Applied Rules10;10-2;35

FOURTH SECTION

DECISION

Application no. 50303/16
Cristian ENE
against Romania

The European Court of Human Rights (Fourth Section), sitting on 10 January 2023 as a Committee composed of:

Faris Vehabović, President,
Iulia Antoanella Motoc,
Branko Lubarda, judges,
and Crina Kaufman, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,

Having regard to:

the application (no. 50303/16) against Romania lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 18 August 2016 by a Romanian national, Mr Cristian Ene, who was born in 1977, lives in Bucharest (“the applicant”) and was granted leave to present his own case in the written proceedings before the Court (Rules 36 § 2 in fine of the Rules of Court);

the decision to give notice of the complaint under Article 10 of the Convention (right to freedom of expression) to the Romanian Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, Ms O.F. Ezer, of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and to declare inadmissible the remainder of the application;

the parties’ observations;

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

1. The applicant is a lawyer. Together with a co-counsel he represented H.G. during a criminal trial.

2. During a public hearing of 17 November 2015 held before the Bucharest Court of Appeal (“the Court of Appeal”) the applicant’s co-counsel challenged A.T., the single judge and bench president sitting in the case. She argued that A.T.’s impartiality was in doubt, on the one hand, because she had dismissed allegedly unlawfully the defence’s requests for evidence and, on the other hand, because a complaint by H.G. to the president of the Court of Appeal about A.T.’s conduct during the case had been referred by the said president to the Court of Appeal’s appraisal commission for judges (“the commission”).

3. A.T. asked H.G.’s representatives to explain how the above-mentioned complaint to the president of the Court of Appeal could affect her impartiality.

4. The applicant stated the following:

“The president of the Court of Appeal has responded that our [complaint] has been sent to [the commission for the latter] to review your activity as judge. As a result, you have every chance to not be awarded a ‘very good’ in your future [appraisal]. [I]n such a situation we, [H.G.’s representatives and H.G. himself], will [be responsible for] hurt[ing] [your] career advancement to the High Court of Cassation and Justice (‘the Court of Cassation’). [F]or this reason we consider it unlikely that [you will] continue to remain a rock of impartiality of the justice act since from the reasons [given] by you in other cases in which you say and ask and correct your colleagues that a judge must prove [that his or her] impartiality is 100% certain, [it transpires that] the act of bias is already the conflict between your personal interest and [that of the defendant]. Do you believe that there is any person in this room who believes that [–] after [you] have [faced] so many complaints [and especially to the commission] which reviews your activity and can punish you professionally,...

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