The national High Court had dealt with the acquittal of the now complainant and the payment of compensation to the complainant in two clearly distinct parts of its judgment, but in several places highlighted that the standard of proof for civil liability to pay compensation was less strict than for criminal liability.
Held: This appeared to cast doubt on the correctness of the acquittal.
‘ However, the court notes that, in its reasoning on compensation, the High Court majority based its finding that the applicant was liable to pay compensation to Ms C on a description of the facts giving details of such matters as the nature of the sexual contact, the applicant’s awareness of the absence of consent by Ms C, the degree of ‘violence’ (‘ vold ‘) used by him to accomplish the act and his intent in this respect. In other words, it covered practically all those constitutive elements, objective as well as subjective, that would normally amount to the criminal offence of rape under article 192 of the Penal Code. It is true that, as stated in the case law quoted above, an acquittal from criminal liability does not bar a national court from finding, on the basis of a less strict burden of proof, civil liability to pay compensation in relation to the same facts. However, the court considers that, although the concept of ‘violence’ may not have been exclusively criminal in nature, the use made of it by the High Court in the particular context did confer criminal law features on its reasoning overstepping the bonds of the civil forum’
31283/04, [2008] ECHR 387, [2011] ECHR 2149
Bailii, Bailii
European Convention on Human Rights
Human Rights
Cited by:
Cited – Adams, Regina (on The Application of) v Secretary of State for Justice SC 11-May-2011
The three claimants had each been convicted of murders and served time. Their convictions had been reversed eventually, and they now appealed against the refusal of compensation for imprisonment, saying that there had been a miscarriage of justice. . .
Cited – Hallam, Regina (on The Application of) v Secretary of State for Justice SC 30-Jan-2019
These appeals concern the statutory provisions governing the eligibility for compensation of persons convicted of a criminal offence where their conviction is subsequently quashed (or they are pardoned) because of the impact of fresh evidence. It . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Human Rights
Updated: 20 January 2022; Ref: scu.267703
