Information Note on the Court’s case-law 29

April 2001

Messochoritis v. Greece - 41867/98

Judgment 12.4.2001 [Section II]

Article 6

Civil proceedings

Article 6-1

Reasonable time

Length of administrative proceedings – period to be taken into account: violation

Facts : The applicant concluded a contract with the State to carry out public works at a military airport. Pursuant to a decision taken in July 1986 by the military authority on whose behalf the work was performed, the State refused to pay for part of the work that had been carried out on the orders of the relevant State department without having been specified in the contract. In August 1986 the applicant a pplied to a number of relevant ministries to set aside the decision of July 1986. Following the ministries’ tacit rejection of his application, he appealed in January 1987 to the Thessaloniki Administrative Court of Appeal, which declined jurisdiction and referred the case to the Athens Administrative Court. In November 1989 that court allowed the appeal and ordered the State to pay the sum claimed by the applicant. In March 1990 the State appealed on points of law to the Supreme Administrative Court. After thirteen adjournments the Supreme Administrative Court dismissed the appeal in a judgment of September 1997. In May 1999 the State paid the applicant the sum awarded by the courts.

Law : Article 6 § 1 – The Government alleged that the period to be taken in to consideration had begun when the applicant lodged an appeal with the Thessaloniki Administrative Court of Appeal and had ended when the Supreme Administrative Court delivered its judgment. The Court agreed with the applicant that the period had begun wi th the applications to the various ministries and had ended when the judgments of the Athens Administrative Court of Appeal and the Supreme Administrative Court were enforced – in other words, when the State paid the sum awarded by those courts. Under the domestic legislation applicable to public-works disputes, court proceedings could not be brought until an application had been made to the relevant ministries requesting them to reconsider their decision; that initial application should therefore be taken into consideration in determining when the period in question had begun. Since the courts had awarded the applicant the sum he had claimed, the period had ended when the sum had been paid – in other words, when the judgment had been enforced – in May 1999. Enforcement of a judgment was an integral part of a trial for the purposes of Article 6. The period to be taken into consideration was therefore more than twelve years and eight months. The proceedings in the Supreme Administrative Court alone had lasted seven years and six months and had been adjourned thirteen times through no fault of the applicant. Furthermore, the Supreme Administrative Court’s judgment had been delivered in September 1997 but the State had not complied until May 1999.

Conclusion : vio lation (unanimously).

Article 41 – The Court awarded the applicant 1,000,000 drachmas in respect of pecuniary damage, 1,000,000 drachmas in respect of non-pecuniary damage and 1,000,000 in respect of costs and expenses.

© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.

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