THIRD SECTION

Application no. 31931/07 ELECTROSAN S.R.L.

against Romania lodged on 17 July 2007

STATEMENT OF FACTS

The applicant, Electrosan S.R.L., is a limited liability company with a registered office in Zalău , Romania. It is represented before the Court by Mr Mihai Bejenaru Drag oş , a lawyer practising in Cluj Napoca .

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

On 22 September 2006 the Sălaj Tax Agency fined the applicant company 200 lei (RON) (approximately 60 euros (EUR)) and ordered the confiscation of RON 32,155 (approximately EUR 9,500), a sum of money the applicant company had obtained by renting out one of its commercial spaces to a third party. The Sălaj Tax Agency held that although the applicant company had registered the sums of money received as rent in the company books and paid tax, it failed to fulfil the lawful requirement to register the rental activity as one of the commercial activities performed by it. The applicant company contested the fine and the confiscation of the EUR 9,500 before domestic courts on the ground that the measure was unlawful and disproportionate. It argued inter alia that the applicant company had registered the rental activity of its own immovable goods as a commercial activity.

By a final judgment of 20 March 2007 the Sălaj County Court dismissed the applicant company ’ s action as ill-founded and upheld the decision of the Sălaj Tax Agency. It held inter alia that while the applicant company had registered the rental activity of its own immovable goods as a commercial activity, in order to perform the rental activity in question it should have registered as a commercial activity performed by it the rental of personal and household goods. Its failure to do so amounted to a contravention under Article 1 (a) of Law no. 12/1990 on unlawful commercial activities and engaged its commercial responsibility.

COMPLAINTS

1. The applicant company complains under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention of the unfairness of the proceedings in so far as the domestic courts failed to consider the arguments and evidence proposed by it.

2. The applicant company complains under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention that the Romanian authorities disproportionately breached its property rights, in that they both fined it for the alleged unlawful commercial activity and confiscated the large sum of money obtained by it from renting out its commercial space to a third party.

QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES

1. Did the confiscation of the sum of money which the applicant company obtained from renting out its commercial space to a third party constitute an interference with the peaceful enjoyment of its possessions, within the meaning of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1?

2. If so, did that interference strike a fair balance between the demands of the general interest and the interests of the applicant company?