European Court of Human Rights

FOURTH SECTION

DECISION

AS TO THE ADMISSIBILITY OF

Application no. 5846/05
by Craig CAMERON
against the United Kingdom

The European Court of Human Rights (Fourth Section), sitting on 29 April 2008 as a Chamber composed of:

Lech Garlicki, President,
Nicolas Bratza,
Giovanni Bonello,
Ljiljana Mijović,
Ján Šikuta,
Päivi Hirvelä,
Ledi Bianku, judges,
and Lawrence Early, Section Registrar,

Having regard to the above application lodged on 19 February 2005,

Having regard to the observations submitted by the respondent Government and the observations in reply submitted by the applicant,

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

THE FACTS

The applicant, Mr Craig Cameron, is a British national who was born in 1964 and lives in Stamford. The United Kingdom Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent, Mr D. Walton of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, London.

A.  The circumstances of the case

The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows.

The applicant received a notice of intended prosecution requiring him to name the driver of his car on 31 March 2003. The applicant declined to sign the form, maintaining that the car belonged to his employer.

On 4 December 2003, the Magistrates’ Court convicted the applicant of an offence under section 172(3) of the Road Traffic Act 1988 for failing to give information as to the identity of the driver of his car. He was fined GBP 400 and ordered to pay GBP 160 costs, with his licence to be endorsed with three penalty points.

The applicant appealed to the Crown Court, invoking Articles 6 and 10 of the Convention. It rejected his appeal after a hearing on 24 November 2004.

B.  Relevant domestic law and practice

The relevant domestic law and practice are set out in O’Halloran and Francis v. the United Kingdom [GC], nos. 15809/02 and 25624/02, §§ 25 31, ECHR 2007 ...

COMPLAINTS

The applicant complained under Article 6 §§ 1 and 2 of the Convention that he had been subject to compulsion to give incriminating evidence in violation of the right to remain silent and the privilege against self incrimination. He also made a number of additional complaints under Article 6, including that he had been denied legal representation, that he was convicted of a different offence in the Crown Court (that he was instead convicted of being a person other than the keeper of the vehicle who failed to give information as to the driver of the vehicle), that the Crown Court did not understand the charge against him and that he had supplied all the information he was required to by law. Article 6 of the Convention provides, so far as relevant, as follows:

“1. In the determination of ... any criminal charge against him, everyone is entitled to a fair ... hearing ... by [a] ... tribunal...

2.  Everyone charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law.”

THE LAW

A. The parties’ submissions

1. The Government

The Government submitted that the present case was indistinguishable from the case of O’Halloran and Francis, cited above, and in particular the facts of Francis, where the applicant was convicted for failure to comply with the section 172 demand.

2. The applicant

The applicant relied on his original complaints.

B. The Court’s assessment

The Court has previously examined cases raising issues similar to those in the present case in O’Halloran and Francis, cited above, where it found, as regards the alleged violation of the right to remain silent and the privilege against self-incrimination, that there had been no violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention and that no separate issue arose to be considered under Article 6 § 2.

The Court has examined the present case and finds that there are no facts or arguments from the applicant which would lead to any different conclusion in this instance.

It follows that this part of application must be rejected as being manifestly ill-founded pursuant to Article 35 §§ 3 and 4 of the Convention.

The Court has examined the remainder of the applicant’s complaints under Article 6 as submitted by him. However, having regard to all the material in its possession, the Court finds that these complaints do not disclose any appearance of a violation of that provision. Having regard to the above considerations, the Court considers that the remainder of the application must also be rejected as being manifestly ill-founded, pursuant to Article 35 §§ 3 and 4 of the Convention.

For these reasons, the Court unanimously

Declares the application inadmissible.

Lawrence Early Lech Garlicki
Registrar President