European Court of Justice Rules Minimum Height Requirement for Police Academy Discriminatory Against Women (October 18, 2017) [1]
On October 18, 2017, the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled [3] in Ypourgos Ethnikis Pedias kai Thriskevmaton v. Maria-Eleni Kalliri that a law requiring a minimum height for entry into a police school regardless of an individual’s sex may constitute unlawful discrimination against women. According to the press release [4], the Court found that a minimum height requirement for men and women constituted indirect sex discrimination because women were far more often at a disadvantage than the men. However, the Court stated that such a law would not be discriminatory where two conditions are met: “(1) the provision of law must be objectively justified by a legitimate objective, such as the operational capacity and proper functioning of police services, and (2) the means of achieving that aim must be appropriate and necessary.”