GOGINASHVILI proti Gruzii

FOURTH SECTION

DECISION

Application no. 35359/23
Nikolozi GOGINASHVILI
against Georgia

The European Court of Human Rights (Fourth Section), sitting on 4 November 2025 as a Committee composed of:

Lorraine Schembri Orland, President,
Anja Seibert-Fohr,
András Jakab, judges,
and Giorgi Badashvili, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,

Having regard to:

the application (no. 35359/23) against Georgia lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 15 September 2023 by a Georgian national, Mr Nikolozi Goginashvili (“the applicant”), who was born in 1975 and lives in Tbilisi, and was represented by Ms N. Parchukashvili, a lawyer practising in Tbilisi;

the decision to give notice of the complaint under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention to the Georgian Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, Mr B. Dzamashvili, of the Ministry of Justice, and to declare the remainder of the application inadmissible;

the parties’ observations;

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

1. First set of court proceedings

1. The application concerns a complaint under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention concerning the alleged lack of impartiality of Judge V.K., who sat on a three-judge panel of the Supreme Court which declared an appeal on points of law lodged by the applicant inadmissible.

2. In particular, the applicant was living at the material time with his father in the apartment registered in the latter’s name. On 5 December 2012, following a long-standing dispute with the electricity distribution company Telasi (“the electricity company”) concerning his father’s failure to pay its services, the applicant, acting on behalf of his father, signed a debt restructuring agreement, according to which the father undertook to repay his debt.

3. It appears from the case file that the applicant’s father failed to comply the newly agreed payment schedule and, as a result, on 20 January 2014, the electricity company instituted proceedings against him seeking compensation for the unpaid debt. In view of the father’s failure to submit, in reply, his position regarding the claim, on 6 March 2014 the Tbilisi City Court delivered a default judgment in favour of the electricity company. The applicant’s father did not appeal against the default judgment, which accordingly became final.

4. In the meantime, on 30 April 2013 the applicant signed another debt restructuring agreement with the electricity company, once again relating to his father’s apartment. On 17 March 2015 the electricity company initiated a separate set of proceedings against the applicant on account of his alleged failure to perform his financial undertakings. The applicant failed to submit a counterclaim and, as a result, on 16 April 2015 the Tbilisi City Court, sitting in a composition of a single judge, V.K., delivered a default judgment against him. Pursuant to Article 232(1) of the Code of Civil Procedure, if the respondent fails to submit a counterclaim, the court, without an oral hearing, delivers a default judgment and upholds the plaintiff’s claim, if the circumstances therein legally justify it. The judgment, without referring to any factual circumstances of the case and without providing any reasoning on the merits, simply noted, with reference to the relevant provisions of the Civil Code, that the circumstances indicated in the plaintiff’s civil claim justified granting the claim. According to the material in the case file, a copy of the judgment was served on the applicant on 27 April 2015; he did not, however, appeal against it.

5. On 21 April 2017 the applicant submitted an application to have the default judgment of 16 April 2015 set aside. He maintained that he had never been served with a copy of either the electricity company’s civil claim or the default judgment itself and that he had only become aware of the proceedings when his property had been seized for judicial enforcement. The applicant also alleged that the summons must have been signed by his father, who, as he added regarding the validity of the signature, had lost his sight. On 28 April 2017 Judge V.K. dismissed the applicant’s request to have the default judgment set aside. Judge V.K. noted, among other things, that the applicant, as confirmed by his own signature, had been personally served with a copy of the default judgment on 27 April 2015; consequently, in accordance with the relevant procedure, the judgment had to have been appealed against within 10 days, a time-limit which the applicant had missed. According to the material in the case file, a copy of the judgment was duly served on the applicant; he did not, however, appeal against it.

6. On 29 May 2019 the applicant settled the outstanding debt with the electricity company.

2. Second set of court proceedings

7. On 4 August 2020 the applicant initiated a new set of proceedings against the electricity company. He requested, firstly, that the debt restructuring agreement of 30 April 2013 be declared null and void, arguing that he had signed it while being deceived; secondly, that the default judgment of 16 April 2015 be set aside on the grounds that his father’s signature on the summons had been forged; and thirdly, that he be reimbursed for the losses he had suffered as a result of the enforcement of the default judgment. On 6 August 2020 the applicant lodged an amended civil claim withdrawing his request to have the default judgment set aside.

8. On 23 March 2022 the Tbilisi City Court ruled against the applicant, rejecting all of his claims. The decision was upheld on appeal by the Tbilisi Court of Appeal on 2 November 2022.

9. On 23 January 2023 the applicant lodged an appeal on points of law. On 20 March 2023 the Supreme Court, sitting in a composition of one judge, V.K., admitted the case for examination on admissibility and the merits. On 23 March 2023 the applicant lodged an application with the Supreme Court, requesting the recusal of Judge V.K. on the grounds that he had previously participated in the examination of another of the applicant’s cases and that, as a result, the applicant and his family had suffered substantial damage. However, the recusal request lacked details, and the applicant failed to specify when, in what capacity and in the context of which specific proceedings Judge V.K. had previously been involved in the applicant’s legal dispute.

10. On 27 March 2023 the Civil Chamber of the Supreme Court, sitting as a bench of two judges without the participation of Judge V.K., examined and dismissed as unsubstantiated the applicant’s request for the Judge V.K.’s recusal. The Civil Chamber ruled, with reference to the subjective and objective tests of impartiality, that the circumstances referred to in the application for recusal had not been supported by any evidence. It noted, in particular, as follows:

“In the present case, [the applicant] failed to submit evidence in support of the facts alleged in his application. Accordingly, the circumstances relied upon in the [recusal] request cannot be regarded as established.”

11. On 18 May 2023 the Supreme Court, sitting as a bench of three judges, with Judge V.K. acting as the presiding judge, declared the applicant’s appeal on points of law inadmissible.

12. The applicant complained, under Article 6 of the Convention, about the alleged lack of impartiality of Judge V.K. on account of his previous involvement in case concerning disputes between the same electricity company and the applicant and his family.

THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT

13. The Court dismisses the Government’s objection that the applicant had failed to comply with the four-month time-limit, noting that although the Supreme Court had rejected his request for Judge V.K.’s recusal on 27 March 2023, the present application was duly lodged with the Cout on 15 September 2023, within four months of the termination of the relevant civil proceedings on 18 May 2023 (see Tsulukidze and Rusulashvili v. Georgia, nos. 44681/21 and 17256/22, § 35, 29 August 2024, with further references). As to the Government’s second objection, that the complaint under Article 6 of the Convention was manifestly ill-founded as the applicant had failed to substantiate it, the Court notes the following: the applicant’s application for recusal was general and abstract, without making any reference to sufficiently specific material facts (see paragraph 9 above).

14. In any event, the Court observes that the applicant did not assert, and there is nothing to indicate, that there had been any personal bias on the part of Judge V.K. (subjective test). As to whether the applicant’s doubts regarding his bias may be regarded as objectively justified, the Court notes that the present case does not concern the dual role of a judge in a single set of proceedings. What is in issue in the present case are two separate sets of proceedings, albeit between the same parties and concerning related factual circumstances. The first set of proceedings, in which Judge V.K. was involved as a first-instance judge in 2015 and 2017, concerned the determination of the applicant’s financial obligations vis-à-vis the electricity company on the basis of the debt restructuring agreement of 30 April 2013. Judge V.K., however, did not deal with the merits of the case, but merely delivered a default judgment against the applicant (see paragraph 4 above). As for the subsequent set of proceedings, in which Judge V.K. was involved as a Supreme Court judge, it concerned the possible annulment of the same debt restructuring agreement of 30 April 2013 on the grounds that the applicant had signed it while being deceived (see paragraph 7 above). Judge V.K., again, did not deal with the merits of the case, as the case was declared inadmissible.

15. The Court notes that the scope and nature of both decisions taken by Judge V.K. in the two sets of proceedings were procedural; in neither case did he engage in an examination of the applicant’s claims on the merits (contrast Stoimenovikj and Miloshevikj v. North Macedonia, no. 59842/14, § 38, 25 March 2021; see also Pasquini v. San Marino, no. 50956/16, § 150, 2 May 2019). Furthermore, in the second set of proceedings against the electricity company, the applicant did not contest the validity of the initial default judgment delivered against him by Judge V.K., as the request had been withdrawn by the applicant himself (see paragraph 7 in fine above), but instead argued that he had signed the debt restructuring agreement of 30 April 2013 while being deceived. In such circumstances, it cannot be said that the substantive issues examined by Judge V.K., sitting as a first-instance judge in the first set of proceedings and as a Supreme Court judge in the second set of proceedings, were intrinsically linked so as to call his impartiality into question (see Warsicka v. Poland, no. 2065/03, § 40, 16 January 2007, and Pasquini, cited above, §§ 150-51; contrast Indra v. Slovakia, no. 46845/99, §§ 51-55, 1 February 2005). Moreover, Judge V.K. was not called on to review his own decisions or to determine whether his application of the law had been adequate and sufficient (see, a contrario, Driza v. Albania, no. 33771/02, §§ 81-82, ECHR 2007-V (extracts), and Scerri v. Malta, no. 36318/18, § 78, 7 July 2020).

16. Lastly, the Court notes, with respect to the recusal procedure, that the applicant’s recusal request was examined by the other two judges sitting on the panel in accordance with the procedure provided for by the Code of Civil Procedure (contrast Tsulukidze and Rusulashvili, cited above, § 56).

17. Considering cumulatively the role of Judge V.K. in both sets of proceedings, the eight-year interval between the cases in which he participated and the extent of his involvement, the Court concludes that the applicant’s fears concerning the objective impartiality of the Supreme Court on account of Judge V.K.’s sitting on the bench cannot be regarded as objectively justified.

18. It follows that the applicant’s complaint is manifestly ill-founded and must be rejected in accordance with Article 35 §§ 3 (a) and 4 of the Convention.

For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,

Declares the application inadmissible.

Done in English and notified in writing on 27 November 2025.

Giorgi Badashvili Lorraine Schembri Orland
Acting Deputy Registrar President