Type: Judgment

Authority: European Authorities: European Court of human rights

Date: 10/23/2008

Subject: The applicant, Gennadiy Vasilyevich Godlevskiy, is a Russian national who was born in 1958 and lives in Oryol. At the relevant time he was a journalist and editor-in-chief of the Orlovskiy Meridian newspaper. In March 2001 Mr Godlevskiy published an article in the Orlovskiy Meridian concerning a criminal investigation launched by the Oryol Regional Prosecutor’s office into the activities of certain officers from the region’s anti-narcotics unit. He alleged in particular that those officers had discontinued prosecution of drug-dealers in order to share the profits from drug sales and that they were therefore partly responsible for the failure to stamp out drug dealing in the region. Subsequently the officers of the Oryol anti-narcotics unit filed a civil defamation action against the applicant and in October 2002 the domestic courts, finding that the applicant had failed to prove that the information published in his article had been true, ordered the newspaper to publish a rectification and each plaintiff to be paid 5,000 Russian roubles (RUR) (approximately 200 euros (EUR)). That judgment was upheld on appeal. Relying on Article 10 (freedom of expression) of the European Convention on Human Rights, the applicant complained about the defamation proceedings against him. The European Court of Human Rights found in particular that the applicant’s article had not mentioned any of the plaintiffs by name but referred collectively to “the police” or “the anti-narcotics unit”. Nor did the applicant cite any confidential information with regard to the investigation or the ongoing criminal proceedings. Indeed, the publication, referring to publically available material from the investigation and an official document showing the numbers of deaths by overdose in the region, had been a fair comment on a matter of evident public concern and had not been a gratuitous attack on the reputation of named police officers. Consequently, the Court concluded that the publication had not exceeded the acceptable limits of criticism and that the interference with the applicant’s right to freedom of expression had not been “necessary in a democratic society”. Accordingly, the Court held unanimously that there had been a violation of Article 10 of the Convention.

Parties: Godlevski c/ Russia

Classification: Freedoms - Art. 11 Freedom of expression