Case Summary and Outcome

The European Court of Human Rights found a violation of the right to respect for private and family life by a radio station for reading out a letter on a morning comedy program which made embarrassing allegations about Mr. Marina and his former wife. Mr. Marina’s sister sent the letter to the radio station, but the station neither verified the contents nor notified him before featuring the letter complete with full names and “gratuitous” insults. The Court considered six criteria defined in previous case law to hold that the domestic court had not properly weighed the competing rights of privacy and freedom of expression. The Court rejected outright the domestic court’s determination that the contents of the letter contributed to “a debate of general interest” and that Mr. Marina, a superintendent at a local police station, was a public figure who should tolerate a higher degree of tolerance towards possible intrusions into his private life. After further considering the content, form and consequences of the publication, the Court found a violation of Article 8 of the European Convention on the part of the Prahova County Court and therefore ordered the defendant State to pay Mr. Marina 2000 euros in respect of non-pecuniary damage, and 100 euros in respect of costs and expenses.

This post by Alberto Godioli originally appeared on the Strasbourg Observers blog and is adapted for our database with permission and thanks.

---

Facts

The applicant in this case is Mr Viorel Marina, a Romanian resident who at the relevant time was a superintendent in the Prahova police. On June 3, 2011, two presenters running a morning comedy show for Radio Prahova read a letter addressed to the radio station by A.M., the applicant’s sister. The letter contained personal information about the applicant and his ex-wife, and made unpleasant allegations about their private lives; among other things, A.M. claimed that the applicant’s ex-wife had ‘slept with every man’, and that the applicant himself failed to attend his father’s funeral. While reading out the letter (without omitting the applicant’s name), the two presenters added humorous remarks about A.M.’s writing style, and about her bizarre decision to send a letter about private family issues to a radio station. A few indicative excerpts from the transcript are provided below, with the presenters’ names abbreviated as Bu. and Bl. (author’s translation from the official judgement in French):

Bu.: I will read it because we are a transparent radio station that cares about its listeners, regardless of whether their name is A., Marina, or whatever; we will read anything that is sent to us, inasmuch as it can be read! The language is… hmm semi-licentious… the funniest thing is that even though the letter is addressed to us, it doesn’t have anything to do with us!

Bl.: With us! Yes…

Bu.: Hmmm well, where can we start? ‘To Radio Prahova’! ‘To C.D., lawyer in court’!

Bl.: Aha!

Bu.: ‘You have slept with every man’…

Bl.: (laughs)

Bu.: ‘And now you want the dowry for the bastard’. There you go, this is the first dedication. This is exactly what it says! (…)

Bu.: To… hmmm Mr Marina Viorel… (…) ‘You weren’t able to attend the religious ceremonies following the death of your father, and now you want the money, you beast of the devil’. (…) This is a letter that probably contains… all of Ms A.M.’s inner conflicts… First it deals with C.D., lawyer in court, who has slept with every man and now wants the dowry for the bastard, and then the dedication to Mr Marina Viorel… Who wasn’t able to attend the religious ceremonies following the death of his father and now he wants money, the beast of the devil. (…)

Bl.: Little Ms Marina… (singing) Marina Marina Marina. When did you last speak with a doctor? It’s mostly a question of… the way in which she conceived this little letter, right? And either way, what is the link with Radio Prahova? Because I don’t…

On the same day, the applicant and his ex-wife complained with the head office of the radio station, lamenting a violation of their right to respect for their private life, and claiming that A.M.’s defamatory statements had been read out by the presenters without any verification. In response to that, Radio Prahova issued a public retraction over a period of four days; it also invited the applicant to exercise his right of reply, but he declined.

In August 2011, Mr Marina’s ex-wife sued the radio station over the damage to her image and private life; she won her case, and the radio station was ordered to pay her damages. In August 2012, Mr Marina also sued Radio Prahova, which was enjoined by the court to pay 4,500 euros in damages in respect of the damage to his image and private life. However, in May 2014 – following an appeal filed by the radio station – the Prahova County Court dismissed Mr Marina’s suit, based on the following arguments: 1) The applicant’s image had not been damaged, since the letter mainly focused on his ex-wife; 2) The applicant was a public figure, and therefore had to tolerate a higher degree of encroachment on his private life; 3) The public reading of the letter was meant by the presenters as a satirical pamphlet ‘aiming to stigmatize some negative aspects of social reality’, namely the fact that someone could express their resentment towards their relatives by writing a letter to a radio station. As a consequence, the radio show had touched upon a matter of general interest, which should therefore be protected under the right to freedom of expression; 4) Mr Marina had declined the station’s invitation to exercise his right of reply.

In February 2015, the Ploieşti Court of First Instance ordered Mr Marina to return the sum previously paid to him by Radio Prahova. Meanwhile, in October 2014, Mr Marina had lodged his application with the ECtHR under Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life). He also relied on Article 6 § 1 (right to an independent and impartial tribunal), since two of the judges sitting on the Prahova County Court had also sat in the case previously brought by his ex-wife against Radio Prahova.

---

Decision Overview

The Court dealt firstly with Mr Marina’s complaint under Article 6 § 1 and found that the applicant’s case was of a different nature to the one previously brought by his ex-wife; moreover, Mr Marina had not requested the removal of the two judges from the County Court at any point during the proceedings. Lastly, there was no evidence that the two judges involved with C.D.’s case could possibly entertain any kind of personal bias. The Court thereby concluded that the applicant’s claim was manifestly ill-founded (Article 35 §§ 3 (a) and 4 of the Convention) and rejected it.

As for the applicant’s complaint under Article 8, the Court first listed the criteria defined in previous case-law dealing with conflicts between Article 8 on the one hand, and the right to freedom of expression on the other. When drawing a line between lawful expression and unlawful encroachment on private life, the following aspects are particularly relevant: 1) Whether the impugned expression contributes to a debate over an issue of public interest; 2) The degree of notoriety of the person affected; 3) The subject of the impugned report or statement; 4) The prior conduct of the person concerned; 5) The content, form and consequences of the publication; 6) The way in which the information was obtained and its veracity (cf. Couderc et Hachette Filipacchi Associés v. France, § 93).

The ECtHR paid particular attention to the first aspect, deeming that the County Court was particularly hasty in classifying A.M.’s letter as a matter of general interest. According to Strasbourg’s Court, ‘the fact that the applicant’s sister decided to divulge family issues through the radio does not transform her behaviour into a matter of “general interest”’ (§ 73). Interestingly, the Court held that the presenters’ position in this respect was aggravated by their decision not to omit the ‘insulting qualifiers levelled against the applicant, such as “beast of the devil”’, since these words clearly did not contribute in any way to broader societal debates (§ 74). After rejecting the County Court’s assumption that the letter touched upon issues of public interest, the Court went on to examine the second criterion, namely the applicant’s standing as a public figure. In this respect too, the ECtHR disagreed with the Romanian court, and stated that the latter should have provided more compelling evidence that Mr Marina’s function effectively called for a higher degree of tolerance towards possible intrusions into his private life; based on the available documentation, the Court was not persuaded that the applicant actually was a renowned figure on a national or a local level.

After quickly touching upon the applicant’s prior conduct, and highlighting that nothing in Mr Marina’s behaviour suggested a particular inclination to divulge aspects of his private life, the Court proceeded to consider the following criterion, i.e. the content, form and consequences of the publication. To this end, the ECtHR singled out three features that had allegedly been overlooked by the County Court. Firstly, the presenters referred to the applicant and his ex-wife by name without their consent, thereby showing no regard for their privacy. Secondly, by issuing a public apology, the radio station implicitly acknowledged that the reading of the letter could be (and in fact was) interpreted by the audience not as a ‘satirical pamphlet’ against A.M., but rather as a direct attack against the applicant and his ex-wife. Thirdly, according to the ECtHR, the latter interpretation had been made more likely by the fact that the presenters chose not to omit the ‘insulting qualifier “beast of the devil”’, which in the Court’s view did not contribute in any way to the discussion and could easily have been left out. At the end of the analysis, the Court also remarked that the presenters had read out the letter without verifying the veracity of the content, thus failing to meet the parameters set by the last criterion (‘the way in which the information was obtained and its veracity’).

In light of the arguments outlined above, the ECtHR found a violation of Article 8 of the Convention on the part of the Prahova County Court; it therefore ruled that the defendant State was to pay Mr Marina 2000 euros in respect of non-pecuniary damage, and 100 euros in respect of costs and expenses.

---