CEDH · CASELAW;COMMUNICATEDCASES;ENG — 27 novembre 2023

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .s379BC09C { margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:right } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s10950C61 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify } .s5E1364CA { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s339D85E6 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s665E407E { margin-top:66pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } Published on 18 December 2023   SECOND SECTION Application no. 13255/22 Amir MAFALANI against Croatia lodged on 1 March 2022 communicated on 27 November 2023 SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE On 29 October 2008 the applicant was arrested by an antiterrorist team of the Special Police Forces in connection with the killing of a well-known Croatian journalist and his business associate. In the case of Mafalani v. Croatia (no. 32325/13, 9 July 2015), the Court found that the applicant had been subjected to inhuman and degrading treatment by the police and that there had been no effective investigation in that respect, contrary to the requirements of Article 3 of the Convention. Following the Court’s judgment, in December 2015 the competent State Attorney’s Office reopened the investigation into the applicant’s ill ‑ treatment. In 2016 six witnesses were questioned, and in 2018 the applicant was questioned. In March 2022, in the context of the procedure for the execution of the Court’s judgment, the Government submitted an action report indicating that in April 2016 the Ministry of the Interior informed the State Attorney’s Office that the identity of the officials who had arrested the applicant cannot be disclosed due to national security reasons and that the investigation, which is formally still ongoing, effectively came to a stand-still. In October 2022 the Committee of Ministers concluded the supervision of the execution of the judgment under Article 46 § 2 of the Convention. Meanwhile, in June 2019 the applicant lodged a constitutional complaint, complaining about the lack of an effective investigation into his ill-treatment. The complaint is still pending before the Constitutional Court. Before the Court the applicant complains, relying on Articles 3 and 6 of the Convention, of the lack of an effective investigation into his ill-treatment by the police during his arrest and subsequent stay in the police station. QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES 1.     Does Article 46 of the Convention preclude the Court’s examination of the applicant’s new complaint under the procedural limb of Article 3 of the Convention? In particular, does the applicant’s present application concern only the execution of the Court’s judgment rendered in the applicant’s initial case of Mafalani v. Croatia , no. 32325/13, 9 July 2015, without raising any relevant new facts, or does it contain relevant new information possibly entailing a fresh violation of the Convention, for the examination of which the Court is competent ratione materiae (compare V.D. v. Croatia (no. 2) , no.   19421/15, §§ 46-54, 15 November 2018)?   2.     Having regard to the procedural protection from inhuman or degrading treatment (see paragraph   131 of Labita v.   Italy [GC], no.   26772/95, ECHR   2000-IV), was the reopened investigation by the domestic authorities in the present case in breach of Article   3 of the Convention?