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The confinement imposed by the regional health authority of the Azores on four German tourists, after one of them was diagnosed with covid-19, in August, was an “illegal detention”, considers the Lisbon Court of Appeal. The health authorities do not have “the power or legitimacy to deprive anyone of their freedom,” defends that court, confirming the release order that it had given in the first instance.
“According to the Constitution and the Law, the health authorities do not have the power or the legitimacy to deprive anyone of their freedom, not even under the label of ‘confinement’, which effectively corresponds to detention, since such a decision only It can be determined or validated by a judicial authority, that is, the exclusive competence, by virtue of the Law that still governs us, to order or validate said deprivation of liberty, is exclusively affected by an autonomous power, the Judicial Power, ”explains the judgment of the Court. da Relação, quoted by JN this Tuesday.
According to the same newspaper, the magistrates who sign the sentence go further and affirm that any person or entity that issues an order of deprivation of physical freedom, ambulatory, regardless of whether it is called internment, isolation, quarantine or prophylactic guard fits in with the legal provisions, that is, in the provisions of article 27 of the Constitution and without having been granted such decision-making power, by force of Law, by the Assembly of the Republic, within the strict scope of the declaration state of emergency or siege ”,” An illegal detention will be carried out, by order of an incompetent entity and for being motivated by a fact for which the law does not allow it. “
The second instance thus confirms the order for the release of the four tourists issued at the end of August by the Judicial Court of the Azores District, in response to a request for “habeas corpus” presented by German citizens.
The case dates back to the beginning of that month. The four tourists traveled after having tested the covid-19 in their country, which tested positive. A week after arriving in the Azores, one of the people fell ill and ended up being diagnosed with the disease. The regional Health Authority forced the entire group to stay in the hotel room where they were staying.
At the end of July, the Constitutional Court had considered unconstitutional the compulsory detention of 14 days that the Regional Government of the Azores imposed on anyone who arrived in the autonomous region.
At that time, the Regional Government had already decided to end the mandatory hotel quarantines for all passengers arriving in the region. Four alternative measures were presented: present a covid-19 detection test on arrival; submit to a test upon disembarking; comply with voluntary quarantine in a specific hotel; or return to the origin.
This decision was made after, on May 16, the Ponta Delgada Court granted a request for immediate release (“habeas corpus”) of a national citizen against the imposition of quarantine in hotels.
Confinement orders in the Azores have been controversial since the beginning of the pandemic. According to the Lusa agency, on August 14 the Azores Judicial Court also ordered the release of two citizens who filed a “habeas corpus” after being quarantined for having traveled to places close to an infected person. , the Court decided to uphold the habeas corpus filed by three citizens “deprived of liberty” since the 24th of that month in a hotel on the island of Graciosa, also due to covid-19.
