Reception desk|The State Treasury has estimated that the compensation amount could be a maximum of 1,500 euros. Recently, the Helsinki Court of Appeal ordered compensation of 7,000 euros to the Vastaamo victim.
Several The lawyers representing the victims of the Psychotherapy Center Vastamo’s data breach are not going to be satisfied with the compensation amounts that the State Treasury has revealed to the public.
The State Treasury pays victims of crimes compensation from state funds. Service Manager of the State Treasury Timo Yliluoma estimated at the end of August To Ylethat the victims of the Vastamo break-in can receive an average of 500–1,500 euros in damages for aggravated extortion or attempted extortion. The basic deduction is deducted from the amount, which according to Yliluoma is 220 euros.
When paying compensations, the State Treasury basically follows the compensation recommendations of the advisory board for personal injury matters (heva). Vastamonuhrit.fi lawyers Paula Pajula and Jenni Raiskio emphasize that the State Treasury has not dealt with a case like Vastaamo before.
“It’s about whether compensation recommendations should be slavishly followed. They are only recommendations. We have stated to the State Treasury that if the compensation for the victims is like this, it will be extremely small. At this point, you can throw the horse’s tables in the trash,” Raiskio tells STT.
According to Yle’s story, the State Treasury has calculated that already this year, the total amount of compensation for Vastaamo victims could exceed two million euros, if there were more than 2,500 applications and each one would be paid about one thousand euros.
Pajula and Raiskio emphasize that the large number of victims cannot be the loss of a single victim.
“For a single person who happens to be in this group, this is a huge thing. The fact that the group is large should not lead to compensation being reduced,” says Pajula.
Rape and Pajula highlight the decision of the Helsinki Court of Appeal in the summer in a case where one of the victims of the data breach demanded compensation from Vastaamo’s bankruptcy estate.
The Court of Appeal agreed with the district court that in Vastaamo’s case, the recommendations of the horse or the previous decisions of the Supreme Court could not be directly used as a model for assessing compensation.
After evaluating the case, the court of appeals held that the compensation had to be higher than the horse’s recommendations, because the data protection violation had targeted a particularly confidential treatment relationship and the protection of the patient’s privacy, and had caused significant suffering to the victim.
Consequently, it ordered Vastaamo to pay 7,000 euros in damages to the victim. The decision of the Court of Appeal is legally binding.
The same position was shared by the professors from whom Raiskio and Pajula asked for a statement for the State Treasury.
In the statement, Emeritus Professor of the Law of Obligations at the University of Lapland Juha Karhu and professor of private law at the University of Turku Mika Viljanen write that in the case there are strong grounds for the fact that gross extortion or the company’s compensation for suffering must exceed the compensation recommendations.
The professors justify their position, among other things, by the fact that Vastaamo’s victims are in a particularly vulnerable position and the crime targeted their mental health information and probably also the sensitive personal information of their loved ones. They also see the publicity received by the story as exceptional, which, according to them, worsens and prolongs the insult experienced by the victims.
The reception desk in a criminal case Alexander Kivimäki was sentenced at the end of April to more than six years in prison. He has appealed his sentence, and the proceedings of the charges will continue later in the Court of Appeal.
The compensation process is progressing at its own pace. Pajula and Raiskio represent about 3,500 victims of Vastaamo, the vast majority of whom have already made a settlement agreement with Kivimäki. On the basis of the agreements, the lawyers apply for compensation from the State Treasury.
The services of Vastaamonuhrit.fi lawyers are free of charge for victims, and everyone who wants to can still join.
All those who have not yet claimed compensation have the opportunity to do so until the verdict in the criminal case against Kivimäki has gained legal force. With these prospects, it is therefore possible to claim compensation at least until spring 2026.
Pajulan and the purpose of the settlement procedure pursued by Raiskio has been to avoid civil lawsuits and to obtain compensation for the victims without a long legal process. They calculate that the procedure will save millions of euros in government funds.
“It also has indirect effects. The longer the process takes, the longer these people have to hang with it. It is then repeated, for example, in the need for mental health services and sick leave,” says Pajula.
However, Pajula and Raiskio are ready to go to court if the compensation amounts remain too low.
“We have wanted to save the resources of the authorities so that this would not have to be handled in the judiciary for years, but we will not accept compensations that are clearly undersized,” says Raiskio.
However, they are hopeful because no decision has been made in the State Treasury yet. The processing of the first applications is scheduled to begin shortly.
“We still live in great hope that the decisions will be fair and proportionate to the suffering of the victims,” says Raiskio.
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