Court finds breach of human right in judicial delays

A court case put off for judgment 13 times by the Civil Court and 28 times by the Court of Appeal was not heard within a reasonable time, the Constitutional Court has ruled, finding this was in violation of the fundamental human rights of the party which had filed the case.

Chief Justice Vincent De Gaetano, Mr Justice Joseph D. Camilleri and Mr Justice Joseph Filletti ruled that the delay was simply unacceptable, particularly bearing in mind that there was no special reason for it.

But the constitutional court noted that this should not be taken to imply that the court hearing the case had had nothing to do but simply that the judges were provided with little or no back-up and an exaggerated list of cases.

Central Mediterranean Development Corporation Limited originally filed its application against the Attorney General before the Civil Court, claiming a breach of its right to a fair hearing within a reasonable time.

The company claimed it had filed litigation in December, 1990 requesting authorisation to be allowed to resume possession of a plot of land at Santa Maria Estate, Mellieha, on the grounds that the land had not been developed and because the ground rent had not been paid.

The suit was decided by the Civil Court on October 5, 1993 after it was put off for judgment 13 times.

The other party had appealed to the Court of Appeal on October 29, 1993 and the appeal proceedings were appointed for hearing by the Court of Appeal for October 17, 1996, three years after it had been filed.

Verbal submissions were made and the case was put off for judgment by the Court of Appeal for January 16, 1997.

But the case was put off 28 times until final judgment was awarded on October 9, 2001.

The company claimed the delays were excessive, and that its fundamental human right to a fair hearing within a reasonable time had been violated by the courts as over 11 years had elapsed from when the case was first filed to final judgment.

The company requested the Civil Court to declare that its fundamental human right had been breached and to provide it with a remedy.

The Attorney General, on behalf of the government, submitted that no breach of the company's rights had taken place and that the delays had been justified in the light of the complexity of the subject matter of the litigation.

The first court noted in its judgment that the case had sustained some delays, particularly when it was put off for judgment by the Court of Appeal.

The reasonableness of the delay had to be examined in the context of the judicial system of the country.

In Malta the right of appeal was, for the most part, an automatic right, and the costs of litigation were also very low.

As a result, the Court of Appeal was inundated with numerous appeals, all of which had to be examined and investigated in detail.

The Civil Court declared that it was not trying to excuse the delays on the part of the courts but to explain that the privilege open to every citizen to file an appeal at a low cost led to lengthy judicial proceedings, particularly at appeal stage.

Although the Civil Court concluded that the delay in the company's case was unjustifiable, it did not believe that the delay was exaggerated enough to seriously prejudice the parties' rights.

The constitutional court found that the first court had correctly analysed the facts of the case, and had found that the period when the case was awaiting judgment before the Court of Appeal was not reasonable.

The 1996 amendments to the Code of Civil Procedure provided for a six-month period in which an appeal had to be appointed for hearing.

This provision of the law was not in force at the time the company's appeal was filed, and the Constitutional Court noted that whoever had suggested the introduction of this six-month time limit was completely cut off from the reality of the judicial system.

There was no point in an appeal being appointed for hearing within six months from its being filed, when, due to the large number of cases filed, this appeal would be put off for over one year.

The six-month time limit could be observed, but it would not affect the length of time a case took to be decided.

The Constitutional Court added that it did not agree with the conclusion reached by the first court to the effect that the delay between the case being put off for judgment and the day judgment was delivered was not unreasonable.

It resulted that judgment was delivered almost five years from when the case was put off for judgment, and the case had been put off for judgment 27 times.

There was no special reason for this delay, for there was no change in the composition of the court which could have led to the case being heard afresh.

The Constitutional Court, which was an appeal court in constitutional issues, appreciated that every court of appeal had to act cautiously and without undue haste, however, in this particular case, the total inactivity of the Court of Appeal for almost five years was simply unacceptable.

This did not imply that the three judges composing the Court of Appeal at the time had nothing to do.

It was precisely because of pressure of other work that the company's case, which was of a relatively simple nature, had given way to other cases which were of a more pressing or urgent nature.

It was an unfortunate fact that in the local judicial system, a judge could be sitting upon three or four different courts with an exaggerated number of cases in each.

The judges were provided with minimum, not to say inexistent, administrative and legal back up, and had also to cope with the bureaucracy imposed by civil service mandarins from time to time.

The court however found that the delays in the company's case were not reasonable, and that there had been a violation of the reasonable time requirement.

As the company had not shown it had suffered material damages as a result of the delay, the Constitutional Court awarded it Lm100 in moral damages as a remedy for the breach of its human rights.