CEDH · CASELAW;DECISIONS;ADMISSIBILITYCOM;ENG — 11 septembre 2025

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .sFE10DC93 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s2EF17D91 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center; font-size:2pt } .s5E1364CA { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s339D85E6 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s5FFF0A77 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:1pt } .s10950C61 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sB9D5CABB { width:28.35pt; display:inline-block } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .s3AAE10DF { margin-top:14pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s3CA22BA { font-family:Arial; text-transform:uppercase } .s6B505E72 { margin:0pt; padding-left:0pt } .s5E8F5A28 { margin-top:14pt; margin-left:25.5pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s2D9C6089 { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s84651E4E { margin-top:14pt; margin-left:14.2pt; margin-bottom:3pt; text-align:justify } .s69DCC830 { margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sC986E16F { font-family:Arial; color:#ffffff } .s68D1564D { width:34.89pt; display:inline-block } .s28108232 { width:142.78pt; display:inline-block } .s5D826FD4 { width:25.88pt; display:inline-block } .s1B61D60 { width:156.43pt; display:inline-block } .s1721E4C5 { margin-top:14pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt }     FIRST SECTION DECISION Application no. 18789/21 Branko KRUŠKOVIĆ against Croatia   The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting on 11   September 2025 as a Committee composed of:   Erik Wennerström, President,   Davor Derenčinović,   Alain Chablais , judges , and Liv Tigerstedt, Deputy Section Registrar, Having regard to the above application lodged on 6 April 2021, Having deliberated, decides as follows: FACTS AND PROCEDURE 1.     The applicant, Mr Branko Krušković, is a Croatian national, who was born in 1966 and lives in Bakarac. He was represented before the Court by Mr G. Marjanović, a lawyer practising in Rijeka. 2.     The Croatian Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent, Ms   Š. Stažnik. 3.     The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows. Civil proceedings for damages on account of unlawful deprivation of liberty 4.     During the criminal proceedings against him on charges of having counterfeited money, the applicant was arrested and placed in pre-trial detention from 20 March 2012 to 31 May 2012. By a judgment of 8   July 2013, which became final on 19 August 2013, the Rijeka Municipal Court dismissed the charges against the applicant. 5 .     At the material time, the applicant was divested of legal capacity; his legal guardian was a social worker. Following the dismissal of criminal charges against him, the applicant had allegedly informed the relevant Social Welfare Centre (“the Centre”) several times of his wish to institute civil proceedings for damages against the State on account of unlawful deprivation of liberty, but the Centre failed to issue the requisite authorisation. 6 .     In order to prevent the compensation claim from becoming time barred, on 12 October 2016 the applicant’s attorney brought a civil action on the applicant’s behalf before the Rijeka Municipal Court, seeking damages for unlawful deprivation of liberty, in the amount of 60,000 Croatian kunas (HRK, i.e., 7,963 euros; “the first set of civil proceedings”). 7.     At the hearing held on 20 September 2017 the Centre stated that it had failed to authorise the bringing of the civil action because neither they nor the applicant had the funds to cover possible costs of such proceedings. At the same time, the Centre was overburdened with cases, and it could not represent the applicant before the court. The applicant’s attorney then agreed to represent him pro bono . 8 .     However, on the same day the Rijeka Municipal Court declared the applicant’s claim inadmissible because his attorney had not provided a power of attorney issued by the applicant’s legal guardian. 9 .     On 3 November 2017 the Centre issued the authorisation to the applicant’s attorney to represent him in the proceedings on appeal. By a decision of 13 March 2018, the Zagreb County Court upheld the first-instance decision, and the applicant’s subsequent extraordinary appeal on points of law was declared inadmissible. 10.     On 23 September 2020 the Constitutional Court declared the applicant’s constitutional complaint inadmissible by a decision received by the applicant’s representative on 6 October 2020. Civil proceedings for damages on account of unlawful or wrongful conduct of the Centre 11.     On 3 April 2018 the applicant’s legal capacity was restored. 12 .     On 5 September 2018 the applicant brought another civil action against the State in the Rijeka Municipal Court (“the second set of civil proceedings”). He alleged that, due to the unlawful and wrongful conduct of the Centre, he had been prevented from obtaining compensation for the unlawful deprivation of liberty. While his legal capacity had been restored, his claim for damages on that account had in the meantime become time barred. He thus claimed compensation in the same amount – HRK 60,000 – that he would have been granted in the first set of civil proceedings had there been no irregularities in the work of the Centre and his legal guardian (see paragraphs 5 and 6 above). 13.     The first-instance court’s judgment of 28 February 2020, granting in part the applicant’s claim, was overturned by the Osijek County Court’s judgment of 11 September 2020, dismissing the claim in full. Following the applicant’s appeal on points of law and his constitutional complaint, lodged concurrently, the proceedings are still ongoing. The complaint 14.     The applicant complained, under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention, that he did not have access to court given that his compensation claim for unlawful deprivation of liberty was declared inadmissible due to the Centre’s failure to timely provide its authorisation for a power of attorney and because the courts applied the procedural rules with excessive formalism. THE LAW 15.     The Government submitted that in his application to the Court of 6   April 2021 the applicant had not informed the Court that he had also initiated civil proceedings for damages against the State on account of unlawful or wrongful conduct of the Centre (see paragraph 12 above). The institution of those proceedings constituted a decisive fact for the outcome of the present case, not least because the applicant thereby sought to obtain compensation for the damage sustained on account of lack of access to court   – i.e., precisely like the applicant’s complaint before the Court. The Government thus invited the Court to either reject his application on the ground of abuse of petition under Article 35 § 3 (a) of the Convention (in that the applicant had knowingly and deliberately failed to inform the Court of a decisive fact) or to declare it inadmissible as premature (in that the civil proceedings which would directly affect his complaint were still pending). 16 .     Without offering an explanation as to why he had not disclosed the relevant information, the applicant contended that the unlawful deprivation of liberty and the unlawful or wrongful conduct of the Centre represented two distinct legal issues. While undoubtedly connected, the issue of shortcomings in the Centre’s conduct could not affect the outcome of the present case, which concerned the lack of access to a court with regard to his compensation claim on account of unlawful deprivation of liberty. 17.     The Court reiterates that a failure on the part of an applicant to inform it at the outset of a fact essential for the examination of the case could, in principle, lead to the application being declared inadmissible for abuse of the right of application within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 of the Convention (see Belošević v.   Croatia (dec.), no. 57242/13, § 47, 3 December 2019, and the case-law cited therein). In order for the Court to reach such a conclusion, the misleading information should concern the very core of the case (ibid.). Moreover, an intention to mislead the Court must always be established with sufficient certainty (ibid.). 18.     Furthermore, whenever an applicant omits, contrary to Rule 44C §   1 of the Rules of Court, to divulge relevant information of his or her own motion, depending on the particular circumstances of the case, the Court may draw such inferences as it deems appropriate, including striking the application out under either of the three sub-paragraphs of Article 37 §   1 of the Convention (ibid., § 48). 19.     The Court therefore finds it appropriate to first ascertain whether the fact that the applicant omitted to inform the Court of his own motion that he had instituted a second set of proceeding for compensation against the State (see paragraph   12 above) may lead it to conclude that it is no longer justified to continue the examination of the application, and that the case may consequently be struck out of its list of cases in accordance with Article 37 §   1 (c) of the Convention. 20.     In that connection, the Court observes that pursuant to section 243 of the Civil Obligations Act, had the applicant brought a fresh civil action for compensation against the State on account of unlawful deprivation of liberty within three months after his first action had been declared inadmissible, by a final decision, for failure to comply with formal requirements (see paragraph 9 above), it would have been considered that the prescription period had been interrupted already by bringing the first action. 21.     Instead, the applicant chose to pursue another legal avenue and brought a civil action for damages against the State on account of unlawful or wrongful misconduct of the Centre, seeking thereby the compensation he had been unable to obtain in the first set of civil proceedings due to the alleged lack of access to a court. 22.     In the Court’s opinion, the institution of the second set of civil proceedings against the State is a fact which undoubtedly constituted relevant information for the purposes of deciding the admissibility and merits of the present application. Namely, should the applicant succeed with his claim in those proceedings and receive compensation for the unlawful or wrongful conduct of the Centre, that compensation would also remedy to a large extent his grievances related to unlawful deprivation of liberty and the related lack of access to court (see paragraph 12 above and compare with Belošević , cited above, § 52). 23.     While there may be different views as to whether the information in question was of crucial importance (see paragraph 16 above), the Court finds that the applicant, who was represented by an advocate, must have been aware that the information was of such relevance for the proper administration of justice that it had to be disclosed. The Court therefore considers that, by not divulging that information when lodging his application, the applicant failed to comply with his procedural obligations under Rule 44C § 1 of the Rules of Court. 24.     In view of the foregoing, the Court considers that the appropriate inference, within the meaning of Rule 44C § 1 in fine , to be drawn from the applicant’s failure to divulge the institution of the second set of civil proceedings, is that it is no longer justified to continue the examination of the application within the meaning of Article 37 § 1 (c) of the Convention (ibid., §   53). Furthermore, the Court is satisfied that respect for human rights as defined in the Convention and the Protocols thereto does not require it to continue the examination of the application (Article 37 § 1 in fine ). 25.     Accordingly, it is appropriate to strike the case out of the list. 26.     In view of this conclusion the Court does not find it necessary to examine the Government’s inadmissibility objections. For these reasons, the Court, unanimously, Decides to strike the application out of its list of cases. Done in English and notified in writing on 2 October 2025.     Liv Tigerstedt   Erik Wennerström   Deputy Registrar   President