Information Note on the Court’s case-law 31

June 2001

Pétur Thór Sigurðsson v. Iceland (dec.) - 39731/98

Decision 14.6.2001 [Section IV]

Article 6

Civil proceedings

Article 6-1

Impartial tribunal

Impartiality of a judge whose spouse's debts were allegedly reduced by a bank party to the proceedings with which he was dealing: admissible

The applicant instituted compensation proceedings against the National B ank of Iceland. The Supreme Court rejected his claim. He claims that he then became aware that one of the Supreme Court judges and her husband had strong financial ties with the bank. The judge’s husband allegedly had enormous debts with the bank and real property belonging to them was mortgaged as a security. The applicant further claims that the bank substantially reduced the debts while the case was under examination. His two requests to the Supreme Court to have the case reopened on the ground of the ju dge’s lack of impartiality were rejected.

Admissible under Article 6 § 1: Under the relevant domestic provisions, the disqualification of a judge did not depend on a request made by one of the parties. On the contrary, it was in the first place for each ju dge to appraise himself or herself ex officio of the existence of any reasons that could justify that he or she withdrew from consideration of the case. Although it was possible for the parties to request that a judge withdraw, the question of disqualifica tion was not a matter primarily of their responsibility. Furthermore, it was not established that the applicant was aware of the composition of the Supreme Court before the opening of the oral hearing. Nor was there anything to suggest that, pending the ou tcome of the Supreme Court proceedings, the applicant had any particular reason to investigate so as to find out whether there was any relationship between the bank and the Supreme Court judge capable of compromising the latter’s independence and impartial ity. Therefore, it was not established that by omitting to raise the matter pending the main proceedings before the Supreme Court, the applicant had failed to exhaust domestic remedies.

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

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