Information Note on the Court’s case-law 50

February 2003

Pascalidou and Others v. Sweden (dec.) - 53970/00

Decision 11.2.2003 [Section IV]

Article 8

Article 8-1

Respect for private life

Intrusion into applicants’ private lives considered to be covered by freedom of press: struck out

The first applicant is a well-known television journalist. The second applicant is her partner and was, at the material time (199 8), spokesman in Sweden for the Council of Europe’s “All different, all equal” antiracist campaign. The third applicant was Chief of Police in the County of Stockholm and police spokesman at the material time. On different dates in January 1998, a journali st contacted the applicants and showed them photographs of an armed and masked man outside their houses. These photographs were published on the front page of an evening newspaper along with an article claiming that the applicants had been threatened by a Nazi terror group. In June 1998, the journalist and five other persons were prosecuted for unlawful threats against the applicants. The five other persons were convicted. The conviction was finally quashed by the Supreme Court in May 1999, which found that the publication of the photographs formed part of journalistic activity for the purposes of the Freedom of the Press Act. The charges against the appellants did not appear in the exhaustive list set out in the Act (which was subsequently amended so as to include them).

The applicants agreed to discontinue their application, made under Article 8, pursuant to the amendment of the Freedom of the Press Act and an ex gratia payment by the Government.

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

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