Schiavo S.R.L. v. Italy

FIRST SECTION

Application no. 60258/13 SCHIAVO S.R.L. against Italy

The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting on 22 October 2026 as a Committee composed of:

Erik Wennerström , President , Raffaele Sabato, Alain Chablais , judges , and Liv Tigerstedt, Deputy Section Registrar,

Having regard to:

the application (no. 60258/13) against the Italian Republic lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 28 June 2013 by Schiavo S.r.l. (“the applicant company”), a limited liability company registered in Italy, which was represented by Mr C. R. Minotto, a lawyer practising in Schio;

the decision to give notice of the complaint concerning Article 6 of the Convention to the Italian Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, Mr L. D’Ascia, Avvocato dello Stato , and to declare the remainder of the application inadmissible;

the parties’ observations;

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

1 The case concerns the excessive length of domestic proceedings and the effectiveness of the compensatory remedy available under the Pinto Act following amendments in 2012, which introduced a statutory cap whereby compensation cannot exceed the value of the claim in the underlying proceedings.

2 Two sets of appeal proceedings were brought by the applicant company against two injunction orders stemming from traffic fines in the amount of 686.70 euros (EUR) each. The proceedings, registered under nos. 726/04 and 727/04, were brought before the Justice of the Peace of Schio on 20 November 2004. By two judgments of 12 December 2005, the Justice of the Peace of Schio rejected the applicant company’s appeals.

3 On 27 January 2007 the applicant company lodged appeals on points of law before the Court of Cassation, registered under nos. 6119/2007 and 6114/2007. The proceedings ended on 28 December 2012, when judgments were delivered in both cases, rejecting the appeals.

4 The applicant company did not lodge an application for compensation for the alleged excessive length of the proceedings under Law no. 89 of 24 March 2001 (“the Pinto Act”), as it considered that any potential compensation available under section 2 bis , paragraph 3, of the Pinto Act would have been negligible, in so far as, according to that provision, the amount of compensation may not exceed the value of the claim in the underlying proceedings.

5 Before the Court, the applicant company complained under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention that the domestic proceedings before the Court of Cassation had exceeded a reasonable time.

THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT

6 The Government submitted that the application was inadmissible for non-exhaustion of domestic remedies. In particular, they maintained that the applicant company had failed to make use of the remedy available under the Pinto Act in order to obtain compensation for the alleged excessive length of the proceedings.

7 The applicant company contested the Government’s objection and maintained, in substance, that the “Pinto” remedy, as amended in 2012, could not be regarded as effective in view of the statutory ceiling introduced by that Act – that is, the amount of compensation cannot exceed the value of the claim.

8 The Court reiterates that, under Article 35 § 1 of the Convention, it may deal with an application only after all domestic remedies have been exhausted. The purpose of that rule is to afford the Contracting States the opportunity of preventing or putting right the violations alleged against them before those allegations are submitted to the Court. Applicants are therefore required to make normal use of remedies which are available and sufficient in respect of their Convention grievances (see Vučković and Others v. Serbia (preliminary objection) [GC], nos. 17153/11 and 29 others, §§ 69-77, 25 March 2014).

9 The Court further reiterates that the existence of remedies must be sufficiently certain not only in theory but also in practice, failing which they will lack the requisite accessibility and effectiveness. However, once the Government have satisfied their burden of showing that an effective remedy was available in theory and in practice, it falls to the applicant to establish that the remedy was in fact exhausted, or was for some reason inadequate and ineffective in the particular circumstances of the case, or that there existed special circumstances absolving him or her of that requirement (ibid., § 77).

10 In the present case, it is undisputed that the applicant company did not avail itself of the “Pinto” remedy in respect of the alleged excessive length of the domestic proceedings.

11 The Court notes that, in the context of complaints concerning the excessive length of judicial proceedings, the remedy established under the Pinto Act was specifically designed to afford redress at domestic level for alleged breaches of the reasonable-time requirement under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention. The Court has consistently held that applicants complaining of the excessive length of proceedings in Italy are, in principle, required to make normal use of that remedy before applying to the Court (see Brusco v. Italy (dec.), no. 69789/01, ECHR 2001-IX).

12 The applicant company has not demonstrated that there existed any such special circumstances as to prove the remedy’s inaccessibility and inadequacy. In particular, it has not shown that the Pinto remedy had been unavailable to it in practice or that there were circumstances which would have prevented it from bringing proceedings under the Pinto Act.

13 The applicant company’s principal argument is instead directed against the statutory ceiling set out in section 2 bis , paragraph 3, of the Pinto Act. It essentially invites the Court to find, on the basis of that provision, that any compensation awarded to it under the Pinto Act would necessarily have been inadequate for the purposes of the Convention.

14 The Court cannot accept that position. The applicant company did not institute proceedings under the Pinto Act and there is therefore no domestic decision concerning the application of section 2 bis , paragraph 3, to the circumstances of the present case. In particular, there has been no determination at the national level of the amount of compensation to which the applicant company may have been entitled, the value of the claim or right (relevant for the purposes of the statutory ceiling), or the manner in which the domestic courts would have applied the relevant provisions to the applicant company’s case.

15 The Court considers that accepting the applicant company’s argument would require it to substitute itself for the domestic courts and to speculate as to how the remedy would have operated in circumstances that were never brought before the domestic authorities. Such an approach would sit uneasily with the principle of subsidiarity, which requires that domestic courts be afforded a genuine opportunity to examine Convention complaints before they are lodged with the Court (see, mutatis mutandis , Mansouri v. Italy (dec.) [GC], no. 63386/16, §§ 84-117, 29 April 2025). If the applicant company had had any doubts as to the possibility of obtaining adequate redress for the excessive length of the domestic proceedings, it would have been for the applicant company itself to dispel those doubts by applying to the domestic courts (ibid., §§ 103-10).

16 The Court accordingly finds that the applicant company failed to demonstrate that the remedy under the Pinto Act was unavailable in practice, that it lacked any reasonable prospect of providing redress, or that special circumstances relieved it of the obligation to pursue such a remedy. Its argument ultimately rests on the predicted outcome of proceedings that were never instituted, which is insufficient to dispense with the exhaustion requirement under Article 35 § 1 of the Convention.

17 It follows that the Government’s objection must be upheld and the application rejected for non-exhaustion of domestic remedies pursuant to Article 35 §§ 1 and 4 of the Convention.

For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,

Declares the application inadmissible.

Done in English and notified in writing on 29 October 2026.

Liv Tigerstedt Erik Wennerström Deputy Registrar President