Check the citations
I am another who does not go 100% with Numbers' analysis......
...... but that comes with a huge caveat.
I am not in a position to doubt Numbers' work here about the ECHR. My skepticism comes from knowing how bureaucracies protect themselves.... and ECHR will pick and choose what they accept based on their own internal prejudices which they will not, exactly, advertise on a website.
Still, I am loathe to go toe to toe with Numbers on this issue. I would not be able to keep up.
I would love to go toe to toe with griffinmill, but 180-degrees from Numbers, he/she presents nothing really to go toe-to-toe with, other than his/her opinion. Griffinmill is entitled to an opinion.
I'm only skeptical of Numbers conclusions only in the sense that I do not know what he may or may not be omitting... not that I think he actually is cherry picking. Just that you don't know what you don't know. I have yet to read a competent opposing argument. Sorry Griffin, but your argument offers nothing but your declarations what the ECHR will do and that the case against Amanda is airtight. Not once do you even offer any logic or citations.
This is not a reasonable counter argument. All it is an opinion seemingly based on nothing but air.
Let me address some of the issues brought out above by Bill and acby.
The ECHR is a multinational organization, part of the Council of Europe, which is a confederation of 47 States spanning the European subcontinent, devoted to the promotion of human rights and democracy. As some of us have stated in previous posts here, Ukraine, Russia, Italy, and Turkey are the States with the highest number of pending cases at the ECHR. The ECHR has in its judgments found Italy in violation of the Convention many times. I am not aware of any information that claims that the ECHR has ever shown favoritism for or against any State. Before becoming too concerned about such issues, one should check for any indication of favoritism or bias in the history of the ECHR.
In terms of the selection of case-law, there is a misunderstanding about that. It may be that guilters simply don't wish to invest the time and effort at educating themselves, or have a different agenda, but if one looks into how the ECHR functions, one can understand that there is no "cherry-picking" of judgments. The ECHR starts adjucation with the Convention and with its extant case-law, a certain sense of what are internationally accepted judicial procedures and defendant's rights, and proceeds to judge cases based on common law principles, including following precedent but adapting or evolving law to meet new situations. These concepts are actually not that complicated, although perhaps they are more familiar to persons living in the US, UK, and other common law countries.
Take, for example, the issue of someone under interrogation. The case of Salduz v Turkey [GC] 36391/02 27/11/2008 established that information derived from such a person, who was not provided with counsel during the interrogation, could not be used to convict that person of a crime. Previously, the ECHR had hinted at such ideas, but not really stated them. In fact, the original Chamber judgment in Salduz did not find the lack of a lawyer during the interrogation a violation. It was only after the appeal to the Grand Chamber that this position became case law.
If one starts with the Guide on Article 6: Right to a Fair Trial (criminal limb), available at:
http://echr.coe.int/Pages/home.aspx?p=caselaw/analysis&c=#n13693846752619364551309_pointer
one can begin to learn the cases and the case-law. One can say that the ECHR has cherry-picked the cases. Additional cases can be found at HUDOC, which is the ECHR library search data-base.
In terms of counter-example cases, those wishing to find them are free to do so. That such counter-example cases have not been presented by guilters may be considered evidence that the counter-examples do not exist.
