判决理由
The state has a positive obligation under Article 2 (right to life) to take preventive operational measures to protect an individual whose life is at risk from the criminal acts of another, where the authorities knew or ought to have known of a real and immediate risk to life and failed to take reasonable measures.
事实
A teacher, Paul Paget-Lewis, developed an obsession with a pupil, Ahmet Osman. Despite a series of escalating incidents and police involvement, no effective action was taken. Paget-Lewis killed Ahmet's father and seriously injured Ahmet.
判决摘要
The European Court of Human Rights held that Article 2 (the right to life) may impose a positive obligation on the state to take preventive operational measures to protect an identified individual whose life is at risk from the criminal acts of another, but that this obligation must be interpreted so as not to impose an impossible or disproportionate burden on the authorities. On the facts, the Court found it had not been established that at the decisive time the police knew or ought to have known of a real and immediate risk to the lives of the Osman family from Paget-Lewis, so there was no breach of the operational duty. The Court did, however, find a violation of Article 6(1): striking out the negligence claim against the police on grounds of the public-policy immunity in Hill v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire amounted to a disproportionate restriction on the applicants' right of access to a court. The judgment established the 'Osman test' for the Article 2 operational duty; its Article 6 reasoning was later reconsidered and effectively qualified in Z v United Kingdom.
关键引述
"It must be established that the authorities knew or ought to have known at the time of the existence of a real and immediate risk to the life of an identified individual from the criminal acts of a third party and that they failed to take measures within the scope of their powers which, judged reasonably, might have been expected to avoid that risk."
— The Court
后续处理
Foundational ECHR authority on the positive obligation to protect life. The 'Osman test' is applied in all Article 2 operational duty cases.
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