Susan Nash considers the latest human rights developments
In Giszczak v Poland (App No 40195/08) the applicant was a prisoner who complained that the authorities’ refusal to allow him to visit his critically ill daughter was a breach of Art 8 (right to family life).
The ground for the refusal related to the gravity of the applicant’s offence and his rude behaviour. He also complained there had been a further violation of Art 8 on account of the authorities’ failure to reply adequately, and in good time, to his request to attend his daughter’s funeral.
He did not go to his daughter’s funeral because he believed that he would have to wear prison clothes with shackles on his hands and legs, and under uniformed police escort.
The government submitted that he had been given permission to attend the funeral handcuffed to an officer but would have been allowed to wear normal clothes. Finding for the applicant, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) considered that the reasons given for not allowing the visit to hospital had not been convincing as the authorities’ concerns
