KOSICE, December 14, (WEBNOVINY) – The plenum of the Constitutional Court of the Slovak Republic led by its President Ivetta Macejkova in a closed session on Wednesday interrupted disciplinary proceedings against the Supreme Court President, Justice Stefan Harabin. Constitutional Court’s spokeswoman Anna Pancurova said the proposal to stay the proceedings was submitted by Harabin. Attached to the corresponding resolution will be a dissenting opinion of Judge Ludmila Gajdosikova and Judges Juraj Horvath, Lajos Meszaros and Ladislav Orosz.
The press release in which the Constitutional Court informs of its decision to stay the proceedings does not state the reason for this decision. Pancurova informed that the Constitutional Court will state the reasons in the written form of its decision.
The Constitutional Court was deciding in a plenary session today about an objection of bias against judges of the Constitutional Court – Peter Brnak, Lubomir Dobrik, and Milan Lalik raised by Justice Minister Lucia Zitnanska and an objection of bias against Constitutional Court Judges Ludmila Gajdosikova, Ladislav Orosz, Jan Luby, Juraj Horvath and Sergej Kohut raised by Supreme Court President Harabin. The Constitutional Court decided to remove judges Dobrik, Horvath, Lalik from the proceedings on the proposal for disciplinary action against Supreme Court President Harabin.
The Constitutional Court also decided that judges Brnak, Gajdosikova, and Luby will not be excluded from the proceedings for disciplinary action against Harabin. The Constitutional Court rejected Stefan Harabin’s proposal to exclude judges Sergej Kohut and Ladislav Orosz from the proceedings.
Justice Minister Lucia Zitnanska filed three proposals for disciplinary action against Harabin. Harabin was already once found guilty of committing a serious disciplinary transgression based on the first motion of Zitnanska from November 2010. At that time, the Constitutional Court decided to punish Harabin with 70-percent reduction of his salary for a year for his failure to allow an audit of the Supreme Court by the Finance Ministry. Later that month, the minister also lodged a second motion against Harabin because she was convinced that he seriously violated the duty of a judicial official, which seriously compromises the trustworthiness of the judiciary in connection with changes in the work schedule at the Supreme Court, disrespecting the principle of random assignment of cases to individual judges. Zitnanska wants Harabin to lose the right to wear the judge’s gown for life and proposes as well that the Constitutional Court decides on his temporary suspension from the Supreme Court top position. She also proposes that the Constitutional Court merges the disciplinary proceedings against Harabin that are already underway and has asked the court to set a date for a hearing, since disciplinary proceedings against Harabin have been excessively protracted. Zitnanska has also filed a criminal motion on a suspicion that a crime may have been committed of interference in court’s independence.
SITA