In Sutherland v Her Majesty's Advocate, the Supreme Court unanimously dismissed an appeal which argued that the use of communications obtained by a paedophile hunter group as evidence in criminal prosecution was a violation of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The case raises fundamental questions of the scope of the right to private life as regards to the content of communications and the role played by private actors in the criminal justice process. This note argues that by limiting the protection of Article 8 to private communications which satisfy a contents-based test, the Court has bypassed the Article 8(2) balancing test to the detriment of the due process rights of the accused. The note concludes that the decision opens up the prospect of the state circumventing the accused's Article 8 privacy rights by lending tacit approval to the proactive investigations of these private ‘paedophile hunter’ groups.

中文翻译：

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数字领域中的公民主导警务：恋童癖猎人和第 8 条在 Sutherland v Her Majesty's Advocate 案中

在萨瑟兰诉女王陛下的拥护者案中，最高法院一致驳回了一项上诉，该上诉辩称，将恋童癖猎人团体获得的通讯用作刑事起诉的证据违反了《欧洲人权公约》第 8 条。该案就通信内容和私人行为者在刑事司法程序中发挥的作用提出了私人生活权范围的基本问题。本说明认为，通过将第 8 条的保护限制在满足基于内容的测试的私人通信，法院绕过了第 8 条第 2 款的平衡测试，损害了被告的正当程序权利。该说明的结论是，该决定开辟了国家规避被告的前景。