CEDH · PRESS;CHAMBERJUDGMENTS;ENG — 24 mai 2007

.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 } .s33165EBA { font-family:Arial; font-size:8pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .s6B505E72 { margin:0pt; padding-left:0pt } .sD711EC90 { margin-left:31.52pt; padding-left:7.48pt; font-family:serif } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .s76CF415B { page-break-before:always; clear:both } .sC7EAD8B { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; text-decoration:underline } .sF6A12959 { width:33%; height:1px; text-align:left } .s2EB42ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:10pt } .s653E6C45 { font-family:Arial; font-size:6.67pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS   336 24.05.2007   Press release issued by the Registrar   CHAMBER JUDGMENT GORODNICHEV v. RUSSIA   The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing its Chamber judgment [1] in the case of Gorodnichev v. Russia (application no. 52058/99).   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 applicant’s treatment in prison; a violation of Article 3 of the Convention in that the applicant was forced to wear handcuffs at public hearings in February 1999; and, a violation of Article 6 § 1 (right to a fair hearing within a reasonable time).   Under Article 41 (just satisfaction), the Court awarded the applicant 10,000 euros for non-pecuniary damage. (The judgment is available only in French.)   1.     Principal facts   The applicant, Arkadiy Petrovich Gorodnichev, is a Russian national who was born in 1965 and lives in Novosibirsk (Russia).   On 19 February 1995 the applicant was arrested in Novosibirsk on suspicion of theft and two assaults committed in 1994 and 1995. On 21 February 1995 he was detained pending trial.   According to the applicant, in November 1995 he was diagnosed with pulmonary tuberculosis. He was admitted to hospital and placed in a cell designed for six people, which housed 24 other detainees suffering from tuberculosis.   Between February 1996 and December 1999 the applicant was held in pre-trial detention centre 52/1 (SIZO-52/1) in Novosibirsk. He submitted that he suffered from haemoptysis (coughing up blood) before the tuberculosis became “bilateral”. In 1999 the doctors observed that one of his lungs had “deteriorated”.   On 28 November 1999 the applicant was transferred to correctional colony no. 349/13 in the town of Nizhniy Tagil (in the Sverdlovsk Region). He maintained that he was kept in the prison’s anti-tuberculosis clinic between February 2000 and March 2001. According to the Government, it was not a clinic but the prison’s anti-tuberculosis medical unit.   On 6 April 2001 the applicant applied to Novosibirsk Regional Public Prosecutor, who informed him that, despite his illness, the prison administration had decided on 23 October 2000 to send him to a disciplinary isolation cell (SHIZO) for 15 days. On 7 November 2000 his detention in the cell was extended by 10 days. Relying on a provision of the prison’s rules by which sick detainees being kept in a medical unit were not allowed to be detained in a SHIZO, the applicant requested that the decisions of 23 October and 7 November 2000 be set aside and that criminal proceedings be brought against the prison administration.   In a judgment of 12 November 1997 Kirovskiy District Court sentenced the applicant to five years’ imprisonment for grievous bodily harm and eight years’ imprisonment for assault causing death. However, he was acquitted of theft.   In a judgment of 4 March 1998 Novosibirsk Regional Court partly upheld the judgment of 12 November 1997. It quashed the part concerning assault causing death (Article 108 § 2 of the Criminal Code) and ordered the re-examination of the case. On 28 May and 11   November 1998 the Kirovskiy District Court ordered additional investigative measures and adjourned its decision.   On 25 January 1999 the Kirovskiy District Court scheduled a hearing for 4 February 1999. The applicant maintained that he was forced to appear in handcuffs at all subsequent public hearings and made several requests for them to be removed, but to no avail.   Following the hearing on 24 February 1999 Kirovskiy District Court ordered an expert medical assessment of the nature of the injuries inflicted on the victim. On 10 March 1999 the Novosibirsk City Medical Investigation Office announced that it had not been possible to carry out the assessment as the court had not given a sufficiently clear indication of the questions to be addressed by the experts.   Nevertheless, Kirovskiy District Court found the applicant guilty of assault causing death and sentenced him on 29 March 1999 to eight years’ imprisonment, to be served in an ordinary prison. On account of various procedural defects attributable to Kirovskiy District Court, the applicant’s subsequent appeal on points of law was not examined until 21   July 1999, when it was dismissed.   On 16 January 2001, after the Court had communicated the applicant’s case to the Russian Government, the Vice-President of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation submitted to the Presidium of the Novosibirsk Regional Court an application for supervisory review ( protest ) of the applicant’s conviction of 29 March 1999 and the decision of 21 July 1999 on his appeal on points of law. Following the supervisory-review proceedings, the impugned decisions were quashed and a re-examination of the case was ordered.   On 17 May 2001 the applicant was found guilty of the offence provided for in Article 108 § 2 of the Criminal Code and was sentenced to seven years’ imprisonment. He lodged an appeal on points of law, which was dismissed on 9 July 2001.   2.     Procedure and composition of the Court   The application was lodged on 1 March 1999 and declared partly admissible on 3 May 2005.   Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:   Christos Rozakis (Greek), President , Loukis Loucaides (Cypriot), Nina Vajić (Croatian), Anatoly Kovler (Russian), Khanlar Hajiyev (Azerbaijani), Dean Spielmann (Luxemburger), Sverre Erik Jebens (Norwegian), judges , and also Søren Nielsen , Section Registrar .   3.     Summary of the judgment [2]   Complaints   The applicant submitted that the conditions of his detention and the lack of appropriate treatment for the pulmonary tuberculosis he had contracted in prison had to be regarded as torture. He further maintained that having to appear before the Kirovskiy District Court in handcuffs amounted to inhuman and degrading treatment. The applicant also complained of the excessive length of the proceedings against him. He relied on Articles 3 and 6 § 1.   Decision of the Court   Article 3 of the Convention   Medical treatment The Court found it established that the applicant had been suffering from pulmonary tuberculosis since November 1995 and that his condition required appropriate medical treatment.   The applicant’s medical records did not contain any information about the nature of the treatment he had been given while in detention and did not mention the dosage of the medicines administered to him. In support of their assertion that the applicant had received the necessary medical care, the Government had not put forward any evidence other than their own statements and documents drawn up in 2001 and 2005, which merely attested ex post facto that such care had indeed been provided. The Government had not submitted any evidence dating from the relevant period to substantiate their statements.   In those circumstances, the Court considered that the national authorities had not taken sufficient care of the applicant’s health after 5 May 1998, except between December 1999 and February 2000, during which time he had been kept in hospital.   Conditions of detention The Court noted that, despite his illness, the applicant had been held in a SHIZO for 25 consecutive days between October and November 2000. Such a measure was in many respects one of the severest punishments that could have been imposed on him during his detention, since it meant that he was prohibited from buying foodstuffs and receiving parcels of food, which his father could otherwise have sent him. In view of the food restrictions resulting from placement in a SHIZO under domestic law, and having regard to the fact that from 1 October to 20 November 2000 the applicant had been denied a 5B-type dietary regime, which, according to doctors, was necessary to improve his health, the Court considered that his allegations that he had been severely undernourished while in prison were not without foundation. It held that the authorities’ failings were particularly deserving of criticism in that food was often an important part of the treatment normally provided to those suffering from tuberculosis.   In conclusion, the Court considered that by keeping the applicant in a SHIZO for 25 consecutive days, despite the fact that he was ill and undernourished and that the law limited the maximum duration of such a punishment to 15 days, the authorities had inflicted particularly acute hardship on him, causing suffering beyond that inevitably associated with a prison sentence. It therefore considered that, during the relevant period, the applicant had been subjected to conditions of detention that amounted to inhuman treatment.   Wearing of handcuffs The Court considered that none of the evidence in the file suggested that had the applicant not worn handcuffs when appearing before the Kirovskiy District Court, there might have been a risk of violence or damage, or of his absconding or hindering the proper administration of justice. That being so, the Court did not find that the use of handcuffs had been intended to exercise reasonable restraint and considered that the measure had been disproportionate to the security requirements cited by the Government.   The Court also attached importance to the fact that the applicant had had to wear handcuffs in public and concluded that, although it had not been shown that the measure had been aimed at debasing or humiliating him, his appearance in handcuffs at the public hearings on 5 and 22 February 1999 – which had not been reasonably necessary to ensure public safety or the proper administration of justice – amounted to degrading treatment within the meaning of Article 3.   Article 6 § 1   Observing that the length of the proceedings to be taken into consideration was four years and ten months, the Court considered that the criminal proceedings against the applicant had not been particularly complex and that their length could not be attributed to his conduct.   Having regard to the failings of the investigation authorities and Kirovskiy District Court, the Court considered that the criminal case in question had not been examined with the requisite thoroughness and expedition. Applying the principle of apportioning responsibility as developed in its case-law, it concluded that that lack of expedition had been attributable essentially to the conduct of the authorities. The Court therefore held that there had been a violation of Article 6 § 1.   ***   The Court’s judgments are accessible on its Internet site ( http://www.echr.coe.int ).   Press contacts 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) Tracey Turner-Tretz (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 88 41 35 30)   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.   [1] Under Article 43 of the Convention, 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.