CEDH · PRESS;GENERAL;ENG — 8 novembre 2005

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .sFE10DC93 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s40F41F73 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:right } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s653E6C45 { font-family:Arial; font-size:6.67pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .s6B505E72 { margin:0pt; padding-left:0pt } .s1C7BEF1E { margin-left:28.52pt; padding-left:7.48pt; font-family:serif } .s37CDBE05 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .s32B93E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:5pt } .s9B49264A { margin-top:5pt; margin-bottom:5pt } .s9AE6264A { margin-top:5pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .s9F8EB0C0 { width:18.63pt; display:inline-block } .s9E97F54A { width:85.05pt; display:inline-block } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sF6A12959 { width:33%; height:1px; text-align:left } .s2EB42ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:10pt } EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS   601 8.11.2005   Press release issued by the Registrar   CHAMBER JUDGMENT KHUDOYOROV v. RUSSIA   The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing a judgment [1] in the case of Khudoyorov v. Russia (application no. 6847/02).   The Court held unanimously that there had been:   a violation of Article 3 (prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment) of the European Convention on Human Rights on account of the conditions of the applicant’s detention in facility no. OD-1/T-2; a violation of Article 3 on account of the conditions of the applicant’s transport from the remand facility to the courthouse and back; a violation of Article 5 § 1 (right to liberty and security) concerning two periods of the applicant’s detention on remand; a violation of Article 5 § 3 (right to be brought promptly before a judge); a violation of Article 5 § 4 (right to have lawfulness of detention decided speedily by a court) on account of the length of   certain proceedings; a violation of Article 5 § 4 as regards the failure to examine the merits of certain of the applicant’s appeals; a violation of Article 6 § 1 (right to a fair trial within a reasonable time).   Under Article 41 (just satisfaction), the Court awarded the applicant 50,000 euros (EUR) for non-pecuniary damage. (The judgment is available only in English.)   1.     Principal facts   The applicant, Doniyor Toshpulotovich Khudoyorov, is a national of Tajikistan who was born in 1965 and lives in Kurgan (Tajikistan).   He was detained on remand from 22 January 1999, when he was taken in custody, charged with the unlawful purchase and possession of hashish (other drug-trafficking charges were later added). His detention was extended while the case was remitted for further investigation, until 28 May 2004, when he was released. The applicant’s detention therefore lasted five years, four months and six days.   He was acquitted on 18 June 2004. From 16 February 2000 to 28 May 2004 the applicant was held in detention facility no. OD-1/T-2 of the Vladimir Region.   The conditions in which he was detained are in dispute between the parties. However, the parties agreed on the size of the cells. The detainees, including the applicant, had to share   sleeping facilities, taking turns to rest. In smaller, 12m² or 24m² cells, where the applicant was kept until December 2000, inmates had less than 2m² of personal space, and in the larger capacity dormitories, where the applicant stayed until his release in May 2004, detainees had less than 3m² of personal space. The parties also agreed that, save for one hour of daily outdoor exercise, for the remainder of the day the applicant was locked in the cell which contained all the facilities used by prisoners on a daily basis, such as the washbasin, lavatory and eating utensils. The applicant was held in those conditions for more than four years and three months.   The Russian Government submitted that the sanitary conditions in the cell were satisfactory. The applicant maintained, on the other hand, that: prisoners infected with tuberculosis, hepatitis, scabies and the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) were occasionally held in his cell; cells were infested by lice, bed-bugs, flies, mosquitoes, cockroaches, rats and mice; detainees were not given any toiletries; and, cells had no ventilation system and were cold in winter and hot and damp in summer.   The applicant submitted that the food was of an extremely low quality while the Government asserted that it met “established legal norms”.     According to the applicant, metal blinds that prevented natural light entering the cells were only removed on 28 December 2002 after a visit from a delegation that included a representative of the Council of Europe. The Government did not contest that information.   The applicant’s relatives were not permitted to see him throughout the pre-trial investigation. After the trial began, he was allowed four short visits by his wife, children, sister and brother. At these meetings the applicant and his family were prohibited from talking in any language other than Russian. The applicant was likewise prohibited from corresponding with his relatives other than in Russian: the facility administration refused to dispatch or hand over letters written in Tajik. The Government explained that those restrictions had been due to the lack of a staff interpreter from Tajik at the facility.   The applicant was transported from the remand centre to Vladimir Regional Court for hearings on 205 occasions in the prison van. According to the applicant, he was held in an individual compartment with another prisoner. Owing to the lack of space, one of them would sit on the bench with the other on his lap. The journey took one hour as the van called at other facilities on its way. The applicant did not normally arrive back at the prison until 6 or 8   p.m. During the day he received no food or outdoor exercise and was liable to miss out on the shower he was allowed periodically. The Government submitted that the applicant had been transported in special prison vans that met the standard requirements and that the journey took 30 minutes.           2.     Procedure and composition of the Court   The application was lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 29 January 2002 and declared partly admissible on 22   February 2005.   Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:   Nicolas Bratza (British), President , Giovanni Bonello (Maltese), Matti Pellonpää (Finnish), Kristaq Traja (Albanian), Anatoli Kovler (Russian), Lech Garlicki (Polish), Javier Borrego Borrego (Spanish), judges , and also Michael O’Boyle , Section Registrar .   3.     Summary of the judgment [2]   Complaints The applicant complained about the conditions of his detention in facility no. OD-1/T-2 and the conditions of transport to and from the courthouse, relying on Article   3. He further complained, under Article 5 §§ 1, 3 and 4, that his pre-trial detention had been unlawful after   a certain period and excessively long and that his applications for release after a particular date had not been considered “speedily”, if at all. He claimed that the length of the criminal proceedings was excessive, in violation of Article 6 § 1.   Decision of the Court   Article 3   Detention conditions in facility no. OD-1/T-2 The Court noted that the parties disputed the actual conditions of the applicant’s detention at facility no. OD-1/T-2. However, there was no need for the Court to establish the truthfulness of each allegation, because it found a violation of Article 3 on the basis of the facts that had been presented or were undisputed by the Russian Government.   The Court considered the fact that the applicant was obliged to live, sleep and use the toilet in the same cell with so little personal space was itself sufficient to cause distress or hardship of an intensity exceeding the unavoidable level of suffering inherent in detention, and to arouse within him feelings of anguish and inferiority capable of humiliating and debasing him. Those feelings were further exacerbated by the inordinate length of his detention.   Furthermore, while it could not be established “beyond reasonable doubt” that the ventilation, heating, lighting or sanitary conditions in the facility were unacceptable from the standpoint of Article 3, the Court noted with concern that the lavatory had no flush system, that until December 2002 the cell windows were covered with metal shutters blocking access to fresh air and natural light and that the applicant was only permitted to talk to his close relatives in a language they did not master, which made contact with his family more difficult. The Government did not suggest that such restrictions were based on security concerns of an appreciable nature. Given those considerations and the lack of personal space, the Court found that there had been a violation of Article 3 concerning the conditions of the applicant’s detention in facility no. OD-1/T-2.   Transport conditions between facility no. OD-1/T-2 and the courthouse The Court noted that the only account of the conditions of transport from the remand facility to Vladimir Regional Court was that furnished by the applicant. His account was corroborated by the written statements of four former cellmates. It was true that the applicant was not able to take exact measurements of the prison-van compartments or obtain certificates showing the occupancy level. However, the Russian Government could have readily submitted details in support of their contentions, but did not do so and gave no reasons for withholding such information. In fact, they confined themselves to asserting that the conditions were compatible with applicable standards and that the travel time was half as long as that claimed by the applicant. No copy of the standards or regulations on prison vans was submitted. In those circumstances the Court examined the merits of the complaint on the basis of the applicant’s submissions.   The applicant maintained that, on the days of court hearings, he was transported to the courthouse by a prison van in which he shared a 1m² “individual” compartment with another prisoner. He received no food during the entire day, missed out on outdoor exercise and, on occasions, the chance to take a shower.   Not having previously examined the compatibility of transport conditions as such with the requirements of Article 3, the Court sought guidance from the findings of the Council of Europe’s Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment (CPT). As regards the transport of prisoners, the CPT had considered individual compartments measuring 0.4m², 0.5m² or even 0.8m² to be unsuitable for transporting a person, no matter how short the duration. In the applicant’s case the individual compartments in the prison van (measuring 1m²) would not appear to have been in breach of the CPT’s standards, assuming that their capacity was not exceeded and that they were sufficiently lit, ventilated and heated and equipped with adequate seating and fixtures that would prevent prisoners from losing their balance when the vehicle moved. However, the applicant had to share the individual compartment with another detainee, the two men taking turns to sit on each other’s lap. The CPT’s findings suggested that it would not have found that situation acceptable. The Court likewise considered that the placement of two prisoners in a 1m² compartment with only one seat was unacceptable. Such transport arrangements were not permissible, irrespective of the duration of the journey.   The Court observed that the applicant had to endure those cramped conditions twice a day, on the way to and from the courthouse, and that he was transported in that van no fewer than 200 times during four years of detention. On those days he received no food and missed outdoor exercise. It was also relevant to the Court’s assessment that the applicant continued to be subjected to such treatment during his trial or at the hearings of applications for his detention to be extended, that is when he most needed his powers of concentration and mental alertness.   The Court found that the treatment to which the applicant was subjected during his transport to and from Vladimir Regional Court was in violation of Article 3. Article 5 § 1   Distinguishing between detention orders which were clearly invalid and detention orders which appeared valid unless and until they had been overturned by a higher court, the Court held that the fact that a decision was later quashed did not automatically make an applicant’s detention during the intervening period unlawful if the reasons given for his detention were not arbitrary and the court had not acted in bad faith in issuing the decision. However, authorisation of a detention period with retroactive effect and keeping defendants in detention after the detention period authorised during the investigation had expired were both practices which were incompatible with the Convention. Further violations of the Convention were found on account of extensions granted in excess of the maximum period permissible under domestic law and the lack of a clear legal basis for one period of detention. The Court consequently found no violation of Article 5 § 1 on account of the applicant’s detention on remand from 4 May to 8 August 2001 and from 9 January to 13 March 2002 and a violation of Article 5 § 1 on account of the applicant’s detention on remand from 8   August 2001 to 9   January 2002 and from 13 March 2002 to 4 December 2002.   Article 5 § 3   The applicant’s detention lasted five years, four months and six days, certain periods of which were not in accordance with Article 5 § 1 of the Convention.   The Court considered that, by failing to address concrete facts or consider alternative “preventive measures” and by relying essentially on the gravity of the charges, the authorities prolonged the applicant’s detention on grounds which could not be regarded as “relevant and sufficient”.   The Court also noted that delays in the proceedings were more than once occasioned by failings on the part of the authorities and that the domestic authorities had therefore failed to display “special diligence” in the conduct of the proceedings. Accordingly, there had been a violation of Article 5 § 3.   Article 5 § 4   The Court found a violation of Article 5 § 4 on account of: the length of proceedings on the applicant’s appeal against the decision of 28 April 2001; the failure to examine “speedily” his application for release of 4   September 2001 and his appeal against the decision of 13 March 2002; the failure to examine his appeals against the extension order of 9   January 2002; and, the failure to consider the merits of his appeals against the decisions of 18 November and 4 December 2002. (Please see judgment for details.)   Article 6 § 1   The Court noted that the period to be taken into consideration in the applicant’s case began on 22 January 1999 when the applicant was taken into custody. It ended on 21   March 2005 when the Supreme Court handed down the appeal decisions. The proceedings therefore lasted six years and two months.   Finding that the main cause of the delays was the conduct of the domestic authorities, the Court considered that the length of the proceedings did not satisfy the “reasonable-time” requirement and that there had, therefore, been a violation of   Article 6 § 1.   ***   The Court’s judgments are accessible on its Internet site ( http://www.echr.coe.int ).         Registry of the European Court of Human Rights F – 67075 Strasbourg Cedex Press contacts:   Roderick Liddell (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 88 41 24 92)   Emma Hellyer (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 90 21 42 15)   Stéphanie Klein (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 88 41 21 54)   Beverley Jacobs (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 90 21 54 21) Fax: +00 33 (0)3 88 41 27 91   The European Court of Human Rights was set up in Strasbourg by the Council of Europe Member States in 1959 to deal with alleged violations of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights. Since 1 November 1998 it has sat as a full-time Court composed of an equal number of judges to that of the States party to the Convention. The Court examines the admissibility and merits of applications submitted to it. It sits in Chambers of 7 judges or, in exceptional cases, as a Grand Chamber of 17 judges. The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe supervises the execution of the Court’s judgments. [1] Under Article 43 of the European Convention on Human Rights, within three months from the date of a Chamber judgment, any party to the case may, in exceptional cases, request that the case be referred to the 17 ‑ member Grand Chamber of the Court. In that event, a panel of five judges considers whether the case raises a serious question affecting the interpretation or application of the Convention or its protocols, or a serious issue of general importance, in which case the Grand Chamber will deliver a final judgment. If no such question or issue arises, the panel will reject the request, at which point the judgment becomes final. Otherwise Chamber judgments become final on the expiry of the three-month period or earlier if the parties declare that they do not intend to make a request to refer. [2] This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.