Information Note on the Court’s case-law 12

November 1999

F.L. v. Italy (dec.) - 25639/94

Decision 25.11.1999 [Section II]

Article 6

Civil proceedings

Article 6-1

Access to court

Complainant unable to recover debt due to length of administrative liquidation proceedings: partly admissible

The applicant was a creditor of a company that had gone into administrative liquidation in 1984. Administrative liquidation wa s a procedure that replaced insolvency proceedings for undertakings operating in a sphere concerning the general interest and was accordingly subject to supervision by the State. Although he had been informed as far back as 1991 by the commissioner appoint ed by the board of directors to liquidate the company that he ranked as a preferential creditor, by 10 February 1999 the applicant had still to recover his debt. In his complaint to the Court that he said that his debt had been outstanding for years becaus e of delays in the administrative liquidation being conducted by the commissioner. He maintained, too, that he had not been credited with interest accrued on the debt after the company went into liquidation and that the value of the debt had depreciated by 115% since the inception of the proceedings. Lastly, he complained that he had been unable to bring court proceedings for recovery of the debt while the administrative liquidation proceedings were under way.

Admissible under Article 6 § 1 and under Articl e 1 of Protocol No. 1 as regards the complaint that the applicant was unable to seek recovery of his debt over a very lengthy period.

Inadmissible under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 as regards the complaint concerning the alleged suspension of interest on t he applicant’s debt. The Court accepted the Government’s submission that interest on preferential debts, such as the applicant’s, was not suspended: manifestly ill-founded.

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

Click here for the Case-Law Information Notes