Communicated on 14 February 2014

THIRD SECTION

Application no. 43045/08 Constan t a DRAGOMIR against Romania lodged on 11 July 2008

STATEMENT OF FACTS

1. The applicant, Mrs Constan t a Dragomir , is a Romanian national, who was born in 1946 and lives in Bucharest .

2. The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.

3. On 24 April 2002 the applicant was involved in a car accident. While she was crossing the street at a crossroads, she was hit by a car which was performing a 180 degree rotation to reverse the direction of travel .

4. According to the report drafted by the traffic police officer who arrived at the scene, the victim and the driver of the car, M.B., gave contradictory statements as to the exact spot where the accident took place. The report further mentioned that there were no eye witnesses to the accident.

5. The applicant was transported to the hospital by M.B. She was diagnosed with spinal injury and fracture of the L1 vertebra. According to a subsequent forensic medical certificate, the applicant ' s injuries required forty to forty-five days of medical care.

6. On 19 June 2002 the applicant filed a criminal complaint against M.B. requesting also civil damages.

7. On 31 January 2005 the prosecutor in charge with the investigation decided that the accident occurred exclusively due to the applicant ' s fault and closed the proceedings. In reaching this decision the prosecutor took into consideration the testimony of an eye witness who declared that the place of the accident was the one indicated by M.B., namely not at the crossroads but further down the street where crossing was forbidden while turning the car was allowed. The eye witness testimony was considered to overweight the contradictory technical expert reports submitted to the file.

8. On 4 August 2005 the Bucharest County Court allowed the applicant ' s complaint and annulled the pros ecutor ' s decision of 31 January 2005 ordering the continuation of the investigation and the performance of a new expert report in order to establish the exact place of the accident.

9. On 23 January 2007, without conducting any new investigatory steps, the prosecutor decided again to close the proceedings due to the applicant ' s fault for the accident.

10. The applicant ' s complaint against this decision was again allowed by the Bucharest County Court which, on 26 September 2007, ordered the continuation of the investigation since the facts of the case had not been correctly established.

11. In a decision issued on 9 June 2008 in the absence of any new investigatory steps, the prosecutor in charge with the investigation observed that the period of time provided by law in order to establish the criminal responsibility for the crime under investigation had expired and therefore declared the investigation closed. The applicant ' s complaint against this decision was finally rejected by the judgment of 15 October 2008 of the Bucharest County Court.

COMPLAINT S

12. The applicant complains under Article s 6 § 1 and 13 of the Convention that the excessive length and lack of efficiency of the criminal investigation led to the expiry of the statute of limitations period which deprived her of the possibility to have her civil claims analysed by a court and also deprived her of having access to an effective remedy .

13. Under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention the applicant also complains of the excessive length of the criminal proceedings which she joined as civil party on 19 June 2002.

QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES

1. Has there been a breach of the applicant ' s right of access to a court, guaranteed by Article 6 § 1 of the Convention, on account of the fact that her civil claim made in the context of the criminal proceedings against Mr M.B. was not examined as a result of their discontinuation due to the expiration of the limitation period (see Anagnostopoulos v. Greece , no. 54589/00, 3 April 2003)?

2. Was the length of the proceedings in the present case in breach of the “reasonable time” requirement of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention?