8.  The applicant was born in Pakistan in 1963 and currently lives in sheltered accommodation in Haina (Land of Hesse, Germany).
9.  In December 1991 the applicant and her husband, a Pakistani national, arrived in Germany. The husband was granted refugee status. In October 1993 the applicant’s own application for the same status was refused. On 16 June 1994 she was granted a temporary residence permit as the spouse of a refugee. On 11 February 1995 she gave birth to a son. In 1998 the couple separated. The son stayed with the applicant, who then worked as a cleaner in different companies.
10.  On 7 September 2001 she was awarded a permanent residence permit.
11.  In March 2004 the applicant lost her job on account of behavioural issues. In July 2004 she and her husband divorced. In 2005 a family court transferred custody rights over her son to her former husband and ruled that the child should live with his father from then on.
12.  On 31 May 2004 the applicant was placed in pre-trial detention for having killed a neighbour. Following an attempt to self-harm, she was provisionally transferred to a psychiatric hospital.
13.  On 13 July 2005 the Giessen Regional Court ordered the applicant’s permanent confinement in a psychiatric hospital. It established that she had committed manslaughter while in a state of mental incapacity, noting that at the material time she had been suffering from acute psychosis. A medical expert certified that she had symptoms of schizophrenia and diminished intelligence, and that she was unaware of her own psychological condition. The Regional Court concluded that she still represented a danger for the general public and therefore had to be committed to a psychiatric hospital. A guardian was also appointed for the applicant.
14.  On 4 June 2009 the Waldeck-Frankenberg administrative authority ordered the applicant’s expulsion. Referring in particular to the act which had led to her committal to the psychiatric hospital and her general state of mental health, the authority concluded that she posed a danger to public safety which outweighed her personal interest in not being expelled, despite her long stay in Germany and her residence status. It noted that the applicant was not economically integrated, had an insufficient command of German, which was an obstacle to her therapy, only had limited contact with her former husband and her son and remained immersed in Pakistani culture. The authority added that the applicant could be given the necessary medical treatment for her condition in Pakistan and receive support from her family there.
15.  The applicant lodged an appeal against that decision with the Kassel Administrative Court, accompanied by a request for a stay of execution. During the interlocutory proceedings the administrative authorities undertook not to execute the expulsion order until the Administrative Court had ruled on the merits.
16.  In November 2009 the applicant was granted certain privileges in the hospital, such as occasional days of leave, and subsequently, after an improvement in her mental health, she started working full‑time in the hospital’s laundry department.
17.  On 1 March 2011 the Administrative Court dismissed the applicant’s appeal. In reaching that decision it noted that she had committed a serious act, that she lacked awareness of her own condition and that there was a high risk of her reoffending. Moreover, she was not socially and economically integrated into German society, especially owing to her lack of German language skills. The Administrative Court added that the applicant had no significant family ties in Germany because she had been divorced for years and parental authority over her son had been granted to his father. With regard to the situation in Pakistan, it noted that according to information supplied by the German Embassy in Pakistan, basic medical care for patients with mental illness was available in large cities such as Lahore and that the applicant could afford the treatment she needed as she would be receiving a monthly pension of around 250 euros (EUR). It found that although members of the applicant’s family in Pakistan had indicated to the German Embassy that they were not prepared to take her in, it was conceivable that they might help her to arrange for the required treatment in return for payment of a few euros. It also endorsed the administrative authority’s conclusion that the applicant had not expressed prominent views in favour of the Ahmadiyya religion, so there would be no specific danger for her in that regard.
18.  On 23 May 2011 the Hesse Administrative Court of Appeal refused the applicant leave to appeal, noting that the Administrative Court had taken into account all the relevant facts of the case. On 2 August 2011 it dismissed a complaint by the applicant of a breach of the right to be heard, in which she had, in particular, argued that the court had not given proper consideration to her submissions on her improved state of health, the death of her sister in Pakistan and the living conditions she would face in the event of her return there.
19.  On 13 December 2011 the Federal Constitutional Court, without providing reasons, dismissed a constitutional complaint by the applicant (no. 2 BvR 1923/11).
20.  Previously, on 24 November 2011, the Marburg Regional Court, on the recommendation of a medical expert, had suspended the implementation of the hospital treatment order and released the applicant on probation (Führungsaufsicht) for a five-year period. The applicant was, in particular, required to remain in regular contact with the hospital’s medical personnel and to continue to take the prescribed medication. The Regional Court held that, thanks to the treatment, the danger of the applicant’s reoffending had receded sufficiently for the residual risk to be tolerable.
21.  Since the expulsion order was issued, the applicant’s presence in Germany has been tolerated under the tolerated residence (Duldung) measures set out in section 60a of the Residence Act (see paragraph 27 below). The latest of these measures, which are generally valid for six months, was ordered on 22 March 2016 and is valid until 17 February 2017.
22.  In its judgment of 23 April 2015 the Chamber held, by six votes to one, that there had been no violation of Article 8 of the Convention (see paragraph 4 above).
23.  Following the Chamber judgment, on 14 September 2015 a panel of the Grand Chamber acceded to the applicant’s request for the case to be referred to the Grand Chamber (see paragraph 5 above).
24.  In their observations of 7 January 2016 on the merits of the case, the Government, in their own name and on behalf of the Land of Hesse, which is responsible for deciding on the applicant’s residence rights, gave an assurance that before taking any measures for the applicant’s removal, the German administrative authorities would issue a new expulsion order taking account of the time which had passed. They further certified that a new expulsion order could not be issued unless and until a thorough medical examination of the applicant had confirmed that neither her removal nor her settlement in Pakistan would expose her to a life-threatening medical risk.
25.  Subsequently, in reply to several questions put by the Court, the Government declared that the administrative authorities would not expel the applicant on the basis of the original expulsion order, that the assurance they had given could be relied on to prevent any attempt to remove the applicant on the basis of the original expulsion order and that the German authorities considered themselves bound by that undertaking at all levels, since it had been made in consultation with and with the agreement of the Hesse Land government.
26.  On 9 February 2016 the Government officially requested that the Court strike the application out of its list of cases in accordance with Article 37 § 1 (b) of the Convention. On that occasion they reiterated the aforementioned assurance, specifying that any new expulsion order would replace the original one and that the applicant would have access to all the remedies available in German law if she wished to challenge it.