Published on 24 October 2022

FIFTH SECTION

Application no. 14657/21 Miroslava KULICHOVÁ against the Czech Republic lodged on 12 March 2021 communicated on 5 October 2022

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

Following the decisions issued by the lower courts and the Supreme Court in the insolvency proceedings, by which the applicant had not been granted exemption from paying the rest of her debts, she filed a constitutional appeal. Although she had challenged in the final summary ( petit ) of her constitutional appeal all the decisions delivered so far, the Constitutional Court (no. III. ÚS 1321/20) only reviewed the decision of the Supreme Court which it endorsed. As to the decisions of the lower courts, the Constitutional Court refused to review them on the ground that they had not been duly challenged by the applicant’s constitutional appeal.

Relying on Articles 6 and 13 of the Convention, the applicant complains about the lack of access to the Constitutional Court. In her view the Constitutional Court erred by not having reviewed the decisions of the lower courts, given that she had duly challenged them in the summary of her constitutional appeal.

QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES

Did the applicant have access to the Constitutional Court for the determination of her civil rights and obligations, in accordance with Article 6 § 1 of the Convention? Namely, did the rejection on formal grounds of the part of her constitutional appeal concerning the decisions of the lower courts result from an omission or excessive formalism imputable to the Constitutional Court (see, mutatis mutandis , Bulena v. the Czech Republic , no. 57567/00, 20 April 2004; Kadlec and Others v. the Czech Republic , no. 49478/99, 25 May 2004; and Zemanová v. the Czech Republic , no. 6019/03, 13 December 2005)?