The European Court of Human Rights has found that a board appointed by the police commissioner to consider disciplinary proceedings against a policewoman was not an independent and impartial tribunal, and the officer, who was dismissed by the force had, therefore, been denied the right to a fair hearing.
Grace Gatt, who was dismissed in 2006, was awarded €25,000 in moral damages and costs.
She filed her case before the European Court in 2016 and her lawyer, Joe Brincat, successfully argued that her right to a fair hearing was breached because the Police Board, which decided disciplinary matters and reported to the Public Service Commission, did not qualify as an independent and impartial tribunal.
Ms Gatt was suspended from her duties in 1999 after collecting funds without permission, at a time when her son had required treatment abroad for a serious medical condition.
She was then taken to court and convicted for the unauthorised collection of funds, landing her a six-month probation order in 2005.
Between 2001 and 2005, whilst suspended from the police on half-pay, she began to work as a private investigator, even travelling to Syria and successfully unravelling an abduction case involving the daughter of a Maltese woman. The case had caught the attention of the media, placing the investigator under the spotlight.
A week later she was invited to share her experience in a local television interview, focusing on the problems sparked by inter-cultural marriages.
Ms Gatt was then charged for acting as a private investigator without a licence. In 2007 she was convicted and handed a suspended sentence.
Meanwhile, two weeks after that same interview, disciplinary proceedings were instituted before the internal Police Board. Following the board's report, the Public Service Commission recommended her dismissal.
The Prime Minister signed her dismissal in December 2006.
Ms Gatt sought recourse before the Maltese courts which, both at first and second instance, failed to enter into the matter of the independence and impartiality of the board and the PSC since Ms Gatt, as a police officer, “was not covered by the protection of Article 6 [right to a fair hearing]” of the European Convention.
She thus took her case before the Strasbourg Court which delivered its judgment on Tuesday, upholding the claim that her right to a fair hearing had been breached.
A chamber of seven judges, including Maltese Chief Justice Emeritus Vincent De Gaetano, observed that the Police Commissioner decided upon the nature of the disciplinary action to be taken against the applicant. In terms of law, the Commissioner also selected the members of the board, namely an assistant commissioner, a superintendent and an inspector, all three his subordinates, “directly or ultimately under his command.”
Since these members were appointed on an ad hoc basis, safeguards against outside pressures were all the more important, observed the court. It further noted that the officers on the board lacked legal training and relied on the views of the Board’s lawyer in so far as legal arguments were involved.
Moreover, the Police Commissioner had “approached the PSC chairman, at least concerning the appropriate punishment to be handed down, the court observed, pointing out that this factual evidence had been confirmed by the Constitutional Court.
As for the Prime Minister, who had acted upon the recommendation of the PSC, he was not a judicial body that had full jurisdiction and provided the guarantees of Article 6.
In the light of such considerations, the court declared that Ms Gatt's right to a fair hearing had been breached since the Police board was not an independent and impartial tribunal.
The court noted that she had claimed €445,529 in pecuniary damages representing loss of salary and lost pension entitlements. However, the court declared that since it could not “speculate on the outcome of the disciplinary proceedings had they been heard by an impartial and independent tribunal,” it dismissed the claim for pecuniary damages without prejudice to any other remedies before the domestic courts.
The court, however, awarded Ms Gatt €15,000 in moral damages and a further €10,000 in respect of costs and expenses.