BILD GMBH & CO. KG v. GERMANY JUDGMENT
In the case of Bild GmbH & Co. KG v. Germany,
The European Court of Human Rights (Fourth Section), sitting as a
Chamber composed of:
Gabriele Kucsko-Stadlmayer, President,
Tim Eicke,
Faris Vehabović,
Branko Lubarda,
Armen Harutyunyan,
Anja Seibert-Fohr,
Anne Louise Bormann, judges,
and Andrea Tamietti, Section Registrar,
Having regard to:
the application (no. 9602/18) against the Federal Republic of Germany
lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection
of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) by
Bild GmbH & Co. KG, a limited liability company registered in Germany
(“the applicant company”), on 16 February 2018;
the decision to give notice to the German Government (“the Government”)
of the complaint under Article 10 of the Convention;
the observations submitted by the Government and the observations in
reply submitted by the applicant company;
the comments submitted by the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights,
which was granted leave to intervene by the Vice-President of the Section;
Having deliberated in private on 10 October 2023,
Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:
INTRODUCTION
1. The case concerns a court ruling ordering the applicant company to
cease publication of CCTV footage of a police arrest without the face of one
of the police officers involved being blurred. The applicant company
complained under Article 10 of the Convention.
THE FACTS
2. The applicant company is a limited liability company with its registered
office in Berlin. It was represented by Mr S. Aroukatos, a lawyer practising
in Dresden.
3. The Government were represented by one of their Agents,
Mr H.J. Behrens, of the Federal Ministry of Justice.
4. The facts of the case may be summarised as follows.
5. The applicant company owns and operates the news website bild.de.
On 10 July 2013 an article was published on the website with the headline
“Here the police beat up D. (28)”. The article referred to a police intervention
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