Denial of access to remedy is a blow to the ECHR
JUDGMENT
I.P. v. Bulgaria (no. 72936/14) 19.01.2017
SUMMARY
Access to a court for reconsideration of detention. The case concerned the placement of a minor in a short-stay institution for young people following a public prosecutor’s order. Referring to Article 5 § 4 (right to a speedy decision on the lawfulness of detention), the applicant claimed that he had been deprived of access to a remedy seeking to reconsider the legality of his placement at the short-stay institution for young people between 15 April and 14 May 2014. The Court has identified a violation of the Convention.
PROVISION
Article 5 par. 4
PRINCIPAL FACTS
The applicant, Mr I.P., is a Bulgarian national who was born in 1999 and lives in Sofia. The case concerned the placement of a minor in a short-stay institution for young people following a
prosecutor’s order.
Beginning in early 2012 the local committee for combatting anti-social behaviour by young people adopted educational measures in respect of I.P., including placing him under the supervision of a
social worker and barring him from frequenting certain places or persons and from changing residence. The measures were taken on the basis of the Young People’s Anti-social Behaviour Prevention Act. In February 2014, taking the view that the measures had had no impact on the applicant, the local committee applied to the Sofia District Court proposing that I.P. be placed in a residential educational facility.
I.P. ran away from home on 1 April 2014 and was found by the police on 14 April. The following day a police officer requested the public prosecutor to order the applicant’s placement in a short-stay institution for young people in Sofia. The same day, on the orders of the prosecutor, I.P. was taken by the police to the institution in question. The District Court gave a judgment ordering I.P.’s placement for one year in a residential educational facility. On 14 May 2014 the young man was transferred from the Sofia short-stay institution to the Rakitovo residential educational facility, where he remained until 30 June 2015.
THE DECISION OF THE COURT
Relying on Article 5 § 4 (right to a speedy decision on the lawfulness of detention), the applicant alleged that he had been deprived of a remedy by which to obtain a review of the lawfulness of his
placement in the short-stay institution for young people between 15 April and 14 May 2014.
Violation of Article 5 § 4
Just satisfaction: EUR 3.000 euros (EUR) (non-pecuniary damage) and EUR 2.000 (costs and expenses)
