Het college van burgemeester en wethouders van Bladel – Court Ruling (Netherlands, 2020)

Appellant's personal data was shared in a document that was available to several Dutch animal protection authorities in the context of a nation-wide action day against rogue dog trafficking. The authorities of Bladel rejected her request for erasure. The Appellant went to court, arguing, among other, that the authorities had no legal basis for processing her data. The Court of First Instance of Eastern Brabant ruled that the local authority of Bladel was allowed to keep processing appellant's data under Article 17(3)(e) GDPR because of the ongoing legal proceedings. According to the Court, it was irrelevant whether it could be regarded that data was processed unlawfully. Apellant argues that her personal data is processed by the local authorities unlawfully. The authority of Bladel asserts that it had used the data for compatible purposes under Article 6(4) GDPR, which means the appellant's appeal must be rejected. The Council ruled that the Court of First Instance was entitled to assess whether the exception of Article 17(3)(e) GDPR took place without having to first assess the lawfulness of the processing. However, the Council noted that the authority of Bladen has changed their reason for rejected the appellant's request from Article 17(3)(e) to Article 6(4) GDPR without properly documenting or demonstrating how purpose compatibility criteria in GDPR are met. The nation-wide enforcement day for which the data had initially been collected, took place n 2016; the fact that appellant initiated legal proceedings against the municipality in connection with that event does not mean that the purposes of processing are compatible.