29/09/2023, 12:35 SANCHEZ v. FRANCE - 45581/15 (Judgment : No Article 10 - Freedom of expression-{general} : Grand Chamber) [2023] ECHR 418 (1… 91. The applicant stressed that section 93-3 of Law no. 82-652 of the Law of 29 July 1982 provided for a duality of actors and a “cascading” hierarchy of liability for the prosecution of an offence, the effect of which was to allow proceedings against the producer only if it was not possible to prosecute the publication director or, failing that, the authors. He noted, however, that there had been no publication director in the present case and that he had been prosecuted as producer even though the two authors of the impugned comments had been identified and convicted. He concluded that the application of the law and his conviction as producer had not been foreseeable. He added that the concept of producer was not defined by law in relation to social media. 92. He further submitted that section 93-3 of Law no. 82-652 of 29 July 1982 did not specify the conditions under which the producer was considered to have had knowledge of the unlawful remarks. It was inconsistent not to require prior notification to the producer, in order to ensure legal certainty, as was provided for in Law no. 2004-575 of 21 June 2004 in the case of hosts. 93. He also disagreed with the argument that his criminal conviction had pursued a legitimate aim, since section 93-3 of Law no. 82-652 of 29 July 1982 was intended to implicate the producer only if proceedings could not be brought against either the publication director or the authors, but that had not been the case. 94. As to the necessity of the interference, the applicant complained that he had been convicted in respect of the first message even though it had been removed by the author himself less than twenty-four hours after being posted. With regard to the comments made by L.R., he submitted that the courts had failed to show that he had been aware of them or that they were manifestly unlawful, merely invoking a presumption of a general duty of enhanced scrutiny based on his status as a politician. He had in any event removed those comments as soon as he had been informed of their existence, upon being summoned by the police. 95. The applicant further observed that the impugned remarks had reflected his party’s political manifesto, which had never been banned, and that they denounced a policy which promoted the establishment of community-specific businesses, thus amounting to political speech and criticism that should be allowed on social media. The remarks in his view were lawful as the language used had been vivacious, rather than vulgar or insulting, and Internet users were entitled to have recourse to a degree of exaggeration or provocation. https://www.bailii.org/eu/cases/ECHR/2023/418.html 47/100