CEDH · PRESS;CHAMBERJUDGMENTS;ENG — 24 juillet 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 } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .sD3427EA2 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic; text-decoration:underline } .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   528 24.7.2007   Press release issued by the Registrar   CHAMBER JUDGMENTS CAFER KURT v. TURKEY FAZIL AHMET TAMER AND OTHERS v. TURKEY   The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing its Chamber judgments [1] in the cases of Cafer Kurt v. Turkey (application no. 56365/00) and Fazıl Ahmet Tamer and Others v. Turkey (application no. 19028/02).   The Court held, unanimously in both cases, that there had been a violation of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights on account of the torture inflicted on the applicants during their detention in police custody.   In addition, in the case of Fazıl Ahmet Tamer and Others , the Court also concluded unanimously that there had been a violation of Article 3 on account of the lack of an effective investigation into the applicants’ allegations.   Under Article 41 (just satisfaction) of the Convention, the Court awarded Mr Kurt 10,000 euros (EUR) for non-pecuniary damage and EUR 1,000 for costs and expenses. In the case of Fazıl Ahmet Tamer and Others , the Court awarded EUR 30,000 each to Fazil Ahmet Tamer, Erol Kaplan, Hasan Demir and Rıdvan Kura, and EUR 25,000 each to Mustafa Demir and Fatma Günay; it awarded the six applicants EUR 5,000 jointly for costs and expenses.   (The judgments are available only in French.)   1.     Principal facts   Cafer Kurt v. Turkey Cafer Kurt is a Turkish national who was born in 1967 and lives in Athens.   The applicant, who was suspected of membership of the Turkish Revolutionary Party ( Türkiye Devrim Partisi) , an illegal armed organisation, was arrested and placed in police custody on 21 May 1998.   On 25 May 1998 the applicant complained to the Istanbul public prosecutor, then to the investigating judge, that the police officers responsible for his police custody had subjected him to intensive torture, and in particular to rape by means of wooden objects and pipes.   On the same date, at the request of the Fatih prosecution service, Mr Kurt was examined by a forensic doctor who found a red patch on his body measuring 2 x 1 cm and a bruise measuring 2 x 0.5 cm on the neck, a bruise measuring 4 x 0.5 cm on the left arm, an injury of 5 cm on the left knee, erythema around the anus and congestive pain in the testicles.   In January 2000 the Fatih prosecution service issued an order finding that there was no case to answer with regard to the complaint of torture made by Mr Kurt against the police officers responsible for his police custody, since there was no evidence that the suspects had committed the offences of which they had been accused. Subsequently, following statements by the applicant to the prosecution service and the judge, the Istanbul prosection service brought criminal proceedings against five police officers who had been responsible for the applicant while in police custody. In June 2004 Istanbul Assize Court declared that the accusations against the defendants were time-barred.   In the meantime, Mr Kurt began a hunger strike to complain about F-type prisons. He began to suffer from Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome [2] . He was declared unfit to serve his sentence and released in April 2002. The applicant travelled to Greece and requested political asylum.   Fazıl Ahmet Tamer and Others v. Turkey The six applicants, Fazıl Ahmet Tamer, Erol Kaplan, Hasan Demir, Rıdvan Kura, Mustafa Demir and Fatma Günay, are Turkish nationals who were born in 1966, 1967, 1967, 1969, 1963 and 1975 respectively and live in Istanbul.   Suspected of belonging to the illegal organisation THKP (Party for the Liberation of the People of Turkey / Union of Refoundation   – People’s Liberation Forces /Yeniden Kuruluş Birliği / Halk Kurtuluş Güçleri ), the applicants were arrested and placed in police custody on 19 April 1994, with the exception of Mustafa Demir, who was arrested on 24 April 1994.   All stated that they had been tortured during their detention in police custody. They claimed that they had been subjected to numerous forms of abuse, including, in particular, “Palestinian hanging” (consisting in suspension by the arms, with the hands lied behind the back), and of having been insulted and deprived of sleep. On 3   May 1994 the applicants were placed in pre-trial detention.   At the close of their detention in police custody, the applicants underwent several medical examinations, which revealed that they were all suffering, among other things, from pain and loss of sensitivity in the arms, together with numbness and reduced movement; all of the applicants also presented numerous bruises and grazes.   The prosecution service launched criminal proceedings against eight police officers belonging to the anti-terrorism unit; the applicants joined those proceedings as civil parties. At their close, in May 2004, the Court of Cassation dismissed the criminal proceedings as time-barred.   The accused policemen, who were formally identified by the applicants as their torturers during the domestic proceedings, incurred no disciplinary sanctions. 2.     Procedure and composition of the Court   The application in the case of Cafer Kurt was lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 1 March 2000. In the case of Fazıl Ahmet Tamer and Others , the application was lodged on 22 April 2002 and declared admissible on 7 February 2006.   Judgment in the Cafer Kurt case was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:   Nicolas Bratza (British), President , Josep Casadevall (Andorran), Giovanni Bonello (Maltese), Riza Türmen (Turkish), Kristaq Traja (Albanian), Stanislav Pavlovschi (Moldovan), Lech Garlicki (Polish), judges , and also Fatoş Aracı , Deputy Section Registrar .   Judgment in the case of Fazıl Ahmet Tamer and Others was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:   Jean-Paul Costa (French), President , András Baka (Hungarian), Riza Türmen (Turkish), Karel Jungwiert (Czech), Mindia Ugrekhelidze (Georgian), Antonella Mularoni (Saint-Marino), Elisabet Fura-Sandström (Swedish), judges , and also Sally Dollé , Section Registrar .     3.     Summary of the judgment [3]   Complaints Relying on Article 3, the applicants in both cases alleged that they had been tortured during their detention in police custody. In addition, in the case of Fazıl Ahmet Tamer and Others , the applicants alleged that the authorities had failed to react in an effective manner to their allegations of ill-treatment, in violation of Articles 3 and 13 (right to an effective remedy) of the Convention.   Decision of the Court   Article 3       Allegations of torture The Court reiterated that, where an individual was injured in the course of detention in police custody, while he or she was entirely under the control of police officers, strong presumptions of fact would arise in respect of injuries occurring during that detention, and that it was incumbent on the Government to provide a plausible explanation of how those injuries were caused.   The Court noted that the medical certificates and reports drawn up in those two cases attested to the ill-treatment experienced by the applicants and that no-one had argued that their injuries could have dated from a period prior to their arrest; the Turkish Government had provided no plausible explanation for them.   The Court considered that the acts of violence to which the applicants had been subjected were particularly serious and cruel and capable of causing “severe” pain and suffering, and therefore amounted to torture. It therefore concluded, in both cases, that there had been a violation of Article 3 on account of the torture inflicted on the applicants.   Investigation in the case of Fazıl Ahmet Tamer and Others The Court noted at the outset that the proceedings against the accused police officers had been very long; they had resulted, more than a decade after the events in question, in a judgment by the Court of Cassation, which had decided to end the criminal proceedings as time-barred.   The Court considered that not only the criminal-justice system but also the disciplinary system, as it had been applied in this case, had proved far from rigorous and had resulted in total impunity for the applicants’ presumed torturers. It therefore concluded that there had been a violation of Article 3 with regard to the investigation conducted into the applicants’ allegations.   Article 13   Having regard to its conclusion under Article 3, the Court considered that no separate question arose under Article 13. ***   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) Tracey Turner-Tretz (telephone: 00 33 (0)3 88 41 35 30) Paramy Chanthalangsy (telephone: 00 33 (0)3 90 21 54 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.   [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] Encephalopathy involving the loss of certain cerebral functions, resulting from a vitamin B1 (thiamine) deficiency. [3] This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.