Judgment II. ÚS 297/22
The Second Panel of the Constitutional Court (Justice Rapporteur David Uhlíř) partially revoked the judgment of the Regional Court in Ostrava, Olomouc Branch, dated 19 October 2021, ref. No 2 To 53/2021-713, which referred part of the complainants with the remainder of their claims and the others with their whole claim for compensation for other than proprietary harm to civil law proceedings. The decision violated the complainants’ fundamental rights to the inviolability of the person and their privacy guaranteed by Article 7(1), to preservation of human dignity and personal honour under Article 10(1) and to a fair trial under Article 36(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms.
The children (complainants), who were treated as victims in the criminal proceedings, turned to the Constitutional Court. The District Court in Přerov found two persons guilty of the misdemeanours of injury to health and defamation of a nation, race, ethnic or other group of persons, as well as of disorderly conduct. The interveners (the convicted persons) committed the above against the complainants by verbally and physically assaulting them and insulting them with derogatory terms referring to their potential membership of the Roma ethnic group. This conduct caused injuries to the complainants that required medical treatment, as well as hospitalisation for some. The District Court imposed suspended sentences of imprisonment on the interveners and ordered them to compensate the complainants for other than proprietary harm. The compensation amounted to CZK 3 000 for each complainant, with the court referring the remaining claims to civil proceedings. The complainants and the two interveners appealed against the judgment of the District Court. The Regional Court in Ostrava, Olomouc Branch, changed the decision of the District Court by the contested judgment, referring the complainants with their claims (or the remainder thereof) for compensation for other than proprietary harm consisting of mental suffering, to civil proceedings. In the Regional Court’s view, in order to accurately determine the effects of the defendants’ unlawful conduct on the complainants, extensive evidence was required that went beyond the scope of the criminal proceedings.
The Constitutional Court upheld he constitutional complaint and annulled the contested part of the Regional Court’s decision, since a significant violation of the complainants’ fundamental rights as victims had been caused by the adhesion part of the contested decision.
The complainants are particularly vulnerable victims of a racial hate crime. It is also relevant and significant that the complainants are children (the youngest complainant was only 9 years old at the time of the crime in question). This further elevates the level of protection that the general courts must afford them as victims of crime. The Regional Court justified its approach diverging from that of the Court of First Instance in an overly formalistic manner. It follows from its reasoning that the complainants could never, in principle, have obtained compensation for other than proprietary harm for the mental suffering they had suffered in the adhesion proceedings, no matter what action they or the Court of First Instance took. If not even the Constitutional Court can clearly understand from the reasoning of the judgment how the complainants should have proceeded in the opinion of the Regional Court, it could not have been clear to the complainants themselves.
If the Regional Court found that the complainants’ statements were sufficiently credible to serve as the main evidence proving the defendants’ guilt, they were also sufficiently credible to enable the Regional Court to decide on the claim for compensation for other than proprietary harm on the same basis (in addition to other evidence submitted by the complainants). It is unacceptable for the courts to “use” the testimony of the injured person, in this case a victim of a crime, as the fundamental basis to decide on guilt, but at the same time not to grant the victim at least to some extent a claim for harm compensation that can be inferred from the very same testimony.
The Regional Court subjected the complainants to impermissible secondary victimisation. The civil procedure to which the complainants were referred does not guarantee the same level of protection to victims of crime as the procedure under criminal law. As a result of the Regional Court’s decision, the complainants would face in the civil proceedings, unnecessarily and for a second time, the persons who have been finally convicted of a crime committed against the complainants, but now without any protection of their privacy or personal data.
General courts have a duty to seek to fulfil the conditions for the award of compensation for damage or other than proprietary harm, especially in cases involving particularly vulnerable victims. It is the duty of the general court to prevent secondary (or even tertiary) victimisation of victims of crime, which it can do by deciding on the award of an adhesion claim, which the victim then no longer has to pursue in civil proceedings. The procedure of the general court, where it arbitrarily disallows the adhesion claim, although the legal conditions for the claim are met, is a violation of the constitutionally guaranteed right of the victim to a fair trial and judicial protection and, in connection with this, a violation of the constitutionally guaranteed rights to the inviolability of the person, their privacy and the protection of human dignity and honour.