CEDH · CASELAW;COMMUNICATEDCASES;ENG — 9 juillet 2025

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .s379BC09C { margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:right } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .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 } .s665E407E { margin-top:66pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s10950C61 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } Published on 28 July 2025   FOURTH SECTION Applications nos. 18325/20 and 37007/20 Ioan COJOCARI against Romania and Smaranda Maria HARACICU against Romania lodged on 21 April 2020 and 4 August 2020 respectively communicated on 9 July 2025 SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASES The applicants are former high-ranking employees of the Timișoara Mayor’s Office. Their applications concern the criminal proceedings for abuse of office entailing unlawful advantages for them or others opened against them and other high-ranking employees of the above-mentioned Mayor’s Office, including Timișoara’s mayor, because they approved and implemented an allegedly unlawful decision to finance the local football club from public funds. By a final judgment of 4 November 2019, the Timișoara Court of Appeal convicted the applicants of the above-mentioned offence by relying on criminal and non-criminal law provisions and sentenced them to three years imprisonment, suspended. The extraordinary appeal for cassation ( recurs ȋn casaţie ) lodged by the applicants against the final judgment of 4   November 2019 challenging the lawfulness of their conviction was dismissed by the High Court of Cassation and Justice on 4 June 2020. In Mr   Cojocari’s case the appeal for cassation was dismissed as inadmissible because he had failed to sign the corresponding application, whereas in Ms   Haracicu’s case it was dismissed as ill-founded. The Court of Cassation noted in Ms   Haracicu’s case that the Court of Appeal had relied inter alia on secondary non-criminal legislation to convict her. Relying on Article   7 of the Convention the applicants complained that their conviction was unlawful because it rested on a legal basis that consisted of both criminal and non-criminal law provisions which lacked the requisite clarity and foreseeability and violated the Constitutional Court’s case-law on the interpretation of the offence of abuse of office. QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES 1.     Does the extraordinary appeal for cassation constitute an effective remedy capable of providing adequate redress for the complaint under Article   7 of the Convention raised by the applicants before the Court (see Lopes de Sousa Fernandes v. Portugal [GC], no. 56080/13, § 134, 19   December 2017, and Communauté genevoise d’action syndicale (CGAS) v. Switzerland [GC], no. 21881/20, § 139, 27 November 2023)?   2.     If so, has the applicant in application no. 18325/20 exhausted the domestic remedy in question, in view of the High Court of Cassation and Justice’s decision of 4 June 2020 rejecting the extraordinary appeal for cassation lodged by him as inadmissible?   3.     If so, did the applicants’ conviction for abuse of office entailing unlawful advantages for them or others rest on a legal basis which met the requirements of clarity and foreseeability within the meaning of Article   7 of the Convention (see, for example, Yüksel Yalçınkaya v. Türkiye [GC], no.   15669/20, §§ 238-39, 26 September 2023 and Delga v. France , no.   38998/20, §§ 57-59, 9 July 2024)?   4.     In particular, did the Timișoara Court of Appeal rely on criminal and non-criminal law provisions, including secondary non-criminal law provisions, to convict the applicants? If so, was the relevant legislation in the applicants’ case applied clearly and foreseeably and in conformity with the Constitutional Court’s case-law on the interpretation of the offence of abuse of office?