ABSTRACT
The applicant was born in August 1982. On 12 February 1993, when he was ten years old, he and another ten-year-old boy, T, had played truant from school and abducted a two-year-old boy from a shopping precinct, taken him on a journey of over two miles and then battered him to death and left him on a railway line to be run over. The applicant and T were arrested in February 1993 and detained pending trial. Their trial took place over three weeks in November 1993, in public, at an adult Crown Court before a judge and 12 jurors. Following their conviction for murder, the judge sentenced them, as required by law, to detention during Her Majesty’s pleasure. There had to be set a tariff to satisfy the requirements of retribution and deterrence. The trial judge set the tariff at 8 years. The Home Secretary set the tariff at 15 years in respect of each applicant. That decision was quashed in judicial review proceedings by the House of Lords on 12 June 1997. The applicant complained that, in view of his young age, his trial in public in an adult Crown Court and the punitive nature of his sentence constituted violations of his right not to be subjected to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment as guaranteed under A 3. He further complained that he had been denied a fair trial in breach of A 6 of the Convention, that he had suffered discrimination in breach of A 14 in that a child aged younger than ten at the time of the alleged offence would not have been held criminally responsible, that the sentence imposed on him of detention during Her Majesty’s pleasure amounted to a breach of his right to liberty under A 5, and that the fact that a government minister, rather than a judge, was responsible for setting the tariff violated his rights under A 6. Finally, he complained under A 5(4) of the Convention that he had not had the opportunity to have the continuing lawfulness of his detention examined by a judicial body, such as the Parole Board. Comm found by majority (17-2) NV 3 in respect of the trial, (14-5) V 6 in respect of the trial, (15-4) no separate issue under 14 in respect of the trial, (17-2) NV 3 or 5(1) in respect of the sentence, (18-1) V 6 in respect of the fixing of the sentence, (18-1) V 5(4).
