Published on 9 October 2023

FIRST SECTION

Application no. 50301/22 Marian BLASKO against Slovakia lodged on 22 October 2022 communicated on 18 September 2023

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

The application concerns two interlinked issues. The first is the impartiality of a tribunal consisting of the presiding judge (A) and two lay assessors ( prísediaci sudcovia ) convicting the applicant of being the principal perpetrator of a drug-related offence in connection with an earlier judgment in which judge A, as a single judge, convicted the applicant’s accomplice (B) of being an accessory to the same offence following a plea ‑ bargaining arrangement ( dohoda o vine a treste ). The precise factual definition of B’s criminal actions or failure to act ( skutková veta ) in that earlier judgment contained references describing the applicant’s role in the offence committed together. Against this background, the second issue involved is the presumption of innocence. When dealing with the applicant’s individual complaint, the Constitutional Court (III. US 46/22) acknowledged that judge A had failed to formulate the judgment of B in a way clearly distinguishing his procedural position from that of the applicant and held that, in that aspect, B’s judgment “clearly could not be marked as perfect”. Nevertheless, it found that “[this] shortcoming alone could not have reached the intensity justifying a conclusion that [A] was biased against the applicant in his proceedings”.

The application raises issues under Article 6 §§ 1 and 2 of the Convention.

QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES

1. In the determination of the criminal charges against him, did the applicant have a hearing by an impartial tribunal, in accordance with Article 6 § 1 of the Convention (see, for example, Peruš v. Slovenia , no. 35016/05, § 38, 27 September 2012; Meng v. Germany , no. 1128/17, §§ 42-52 and 54-63, 16 February 2021; and Mucha v. Slovakia , no. 63703/19, §§ 50-68, 25 November 2021)?

2. Was the presumption of innocence, guaranteed by Article 6 § 2 of the Convention, respected in the present case?

In particular, in the judgment concerning B, did the court make it sufficiently clear that it was not also implicitly determining the applicant’s guilt, so as to avoid, as far as possible, giving the impression that it was prejudging it (see, for example, Karaman v. Germany , no. 17103/10, §§ 63, 64, 67 and 70, 27 February 2014, and Bauras v. Lithuania , no. 56795/13, § 54, 31 October 2017)?