CEDH · CASELAW;COMMUNICATEDCASES;ENG — 30 mai 2024

.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 17 June 2024   FOURTH SECTION Application no. 798/21 Sorin-Cosmin DRĂGHIA against Romania lodged on 14 December 2020 communicated on 30 May 2024 SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE The application concerns criminal proceedings against the applicant and several of his co-defendants in connection with drug-trafficking offences. By a final decision of 3 September 2020, the Timisoara Court of Appeal convicted the applicant of one count of illegal drug trafficking and unlawful possession of cannabis and sentenced him to five years’ imprisonment. The court accepted the prosecution’s version of events, according to which the applicant was the drug supplier of one of the co-defendants, S.A., and had provided the latter with two MDBA (ecstasy) pills which were sold to an undercover agent. Before the investigating and judicial authorities, the applicant admitted possessing cannabis for his own use, but disputed that he was selling high ‑ risk drugs. His conviction was mainly based on evidence obtained following an undercover operation involving the sale of two MDBA pills by S.A. to an undercover agent on 5 April 2017 and a search of his flat. In his appeal the applicant claimed that S.A. had implicated him in the drug-trafficking offence and named him as his supplier in return for a more lenient sentence. As S.A. entered into a plea agreement with the prosecution the court sentenced him to a suspended penalty of two years’ imprisonment. Before the appeal court the applicant requested as evidence the hearing of two witnesses, who had shared their flat with him and whose statements had been in his view essential in establishing the context in which he had provided S.A. with the two MDBA pills. The appeal court rejected the applicant’s request for evidence by an interlocutory judgment of 2 July 2020, stating that there was sufficient information in the file. The applicant complains under Article 6 §§ 1 and 3 (d) of the Convention that the criminal proceedings against him were unfair because he was deprived of any opportunity to prove his innocence and was not able to obtain the attendance of two key witnesses on his behalf. QUESTION TO THE PARTIES Did the applicant have a fair hearing in respect of the principle of equality of arms, as required by Article 6 §§ 1 and 3 (d) of the Convention? In particular, did the appeal court consider the relevance of the testimonies of the two witnesses adduced by the defence and provide sufficient reasons for their decisions not to examine them (see,   mutatis mutandis ,   Murtazaliyeva v.   Russia   [GC], no. 36658/05, §§ 139-168, 18   December 2018)?