CEDH · PRESS;CHAMBERJUDGMENTS;ENG — 25 octobre 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 } .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 } .s83BE5C30 { font-family:Arial; font-size:8pt; vertical-align:super } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .sC7EAD8B { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; text-decoration:underline } .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   722 25.10.2007   Press release issued by the Registrar   CHAMBER JUDGMENT YAKOVENKO v. UKRAINE   The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing its Chamber judgment [1] in the case of Yakovenko v. Ukraine (application no. 15825/06).   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 concerning the conditions of Oleg   Yakovenko’s detention in the Sevastopol Detention Centre; a violation of Article 3 of the Convention concerning the authorities’ failure to provide appropriate medical care to Mr Yakovenko; a violation of Article 3 concerning the treatment to which Mr Yakovenko was subjected while being transported between the Sevastopol and Simferopol detention centres; and, a violation of Article 13 (right to an effective remedy).   Under Article 41 (just satisfaction), the Court awarded 434   euros   (EUR) for pecuniary damage, EUR   10,000 for non-pecuniary damage and EUR   23 for costs and expenses. (The judgment is available only in English.)   1.     Principal facts   The applicant, Oleg Nikolayevich Yakovenko, was a Ukrainian national who was born in 1975 and lived in Sevastopol. He died on 8 May 2007.   The case concerned detention conditions of Mr Yakovenko, who had tuberculosis and was HIV-positive.   In June 2003 Mr Yakovenko, on probation following a conviction for burglary, was arrested and placed in police custody, again on suspicion of burglary. The applicant alleged that he confessed to that crime after being subjected to ill-treatment in police custody and retracted his statements when on trial before Balaklavsky District Court. In November 2005 he was found guilty as charged and sentenced to three years and seven months’ imprisonment, later reduced on appeal in October 2006 to three years and six months. Awaiting that conviction Mr Yakovenko was detained in the Simferopol Detention Centre (Simferopol SIZO). As the police, prosecution and judicial authorities who dealt with his case were based in Sevastopol, he was transferred each month to the Sevastopol Detention Centre (Sevastopol ITT). Between June 2003 and April 2006, he spent in total about one year in that facility.   The applicant claimed that Sevastopol ITT was constantly overcrowded: he was held in cells of 15 to 22   m 2 with 25 to 30 inmates. To corroborate that claim, the applicant submitted a letter of 10 May 2005 from the Head of Sevastopol City Police Department which stated that 240 inmates were held in the detention centre, which was designed to hold a maximum of 82 detainees. The applicant further alleged that inmates had to take turns to sleep, that the lights in the cells, situated in the basement, were permanently on and that the ventilation system was often out of order.   The Government contested those allegations. It claimed that the applicant was detained in a cell of 16   m 2 which he shared with four to six other inmates and that the conditions met the applicable relevant standards.   The applicant further claimed that the conditions of transport both by road and rail between the Simferopol SIZO and Sevastopol ITT were inhuman and degrading. The 80   km journey took 36 to 48   hours in prison vans and passenger compartments of trains which were severely overcrowded, dimly lit and poorly ventilated. No food or drink was provided.   The Government disagreed: the journey lasted eight hours, the maximum capacity of the vehicles was never exceeded (detainees had 0.3   m 2 of space in the vans and 0.4   m 2 in the trains) and detainees were given breakfast beforehand.   In the meantime, the applicant’s health started to deteriorate. He remained in Sevastopol ITT which had no doctor or paramedic. A letter of 25 April 2006 from the Governor of the Simferopol SIZO confirmed that he had had an HIV blood test in February 2006. The applicant claimed that he was diagnosed HIV positive on 21   February 2006 by a healthcare centre but that the prison authorities, who were aware of the results, had not informed him until 20 April 2006. The Government denied that allegation, stating that the applicant had only first been diagnosed on 20 April 2006.   From April 2006, the applicant had a temperature of around 40   Cº and could hardly move or eat without help. Sevastopol ITT called for an ambulance on two occasions. On the first occasion, a doctor’s recommendation that he be taken to a specialised hospital was refused. The applicant’s health steadily worsened and he was taken to hospital twice. The first time was on 14 April: the parties disagreed as to whether hospitalisation was recommended. The second time was on 20 April: a written recommendation of 21 April confirmed the applicant’s need for specialised medical treatment. As that recommendation was not followed through, the applicant’s mother lodged a complaint with the Prosecutor General in which she alleged that Sevastopol ITT had unlawfully refused to hospitalise her son and that he was in a critical condition. Ultimately, the applicant was transferred to the Sevastopol Anti-Tuberculosis Healthcare Centre on 28 April 2006, following a request made by the European Court of Human Rights under the emergency measures of Rule 39 of the Rules of Court.   Oleg Yakovenko died on 8 May 2007.   2.     Procedure and composition of the Court   The application was lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 26 April 2006.   Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:   Peer Lorenzen (Danish), President , Snejana Botoucharova (Bulgarian), Karel Jungwiert (Czech), Volodymyr Butkevych (Ukrainian), Margarita Tsatsa-Nikolovska (citizen of “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”), Rait Maruste (Estonian), Renate Jaeger (German), judges , and also Claudia Westerdiek , Section Registrar .   3.     Summary of the judgment [2]   Complaints   Relying, in particular, on Article 3 (prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment) and Article 13 (right to an effective remedy), Mr Yakovenko complained about: ill-treatment while in police custody; inhuman conditions of detention in Sevastopol ITT and when being transported to and from that facility; and, lack of medical care.   Decision of the Court   Article 3   The applicant’s complaint concerning ill-treatment in police custody was rejected because he had failed to appeal against the decision of the prosecutor’s office not to bring criminal proceedings concerning his allegations.   Conditions of detention in Sevastopol ITT   The Court noted that the Council of Europe’s European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (the “CPT”) had visited the Sevastopol ITT in 2000 and observed that cells of 15 m 2 contained up to 10 detainees. The letter of 10 May 2005 from the Head of the Sevastopol City Police Department, which acknowledged that the Sevastopol ITT held almost three times its capacity of detainees, and recent internal and international reports, indicated that that situation had not improved since 2000. In the Court’s view, the applicant’s personal space could have been no larger than 1.5   m 2 and his cells had therefore been continuously and severely overcrowded.   Given that finding, the Court also found that the applicant’s claims concerning sleeping conditions to be sufficiently substantiated. The resulting deprivation of sleep must have been physically and psychologically difficult for him. The CPT report of 2000 also noted that any natural light from the cell windows had been obstructed by dense metal netting, that artificial light was insufficient and that the cell’s ventilation was inadequate.   In the light of its findings above concerning overcrowding, sleep deprivation and lack of natural light and air, the Court concluded that the conditions of the applicant's detention in the Sevastopol ITT had amounted to degrading treatment. Accordingly, there had been a violation of Article 3.   Lack of medical care   Referring to the letter of 25 April 2006, the Court saw no reason not to trust the applicant’s claim that the prison authorities had been aware of the fact that he was HIV positive as of 21 February 2006. Furthermore, the Government had not commented on that allegation.   Therefore, although the prison authorities had known of the applicant’s condition, no urgent medical measures, as stipulated in Decree No. 186/607 on the treatment of detainees with HIV/AIDS, had been taken. Notably, he had not been given antiretroviral treatment, had not been monitored for infections and had only been registered as an HIV patient at the local anti-AIDS centre in May 2006. Instead, the authorities had continued to send him to the Sevastopol ITT, which had no medical staff.   The Government argued that it was possible to call for an ambulance each time the deterioration in the applicant’s health had warranted medical intervention. Indeed, an ambulance had been called for twice and the applicant had been sent to hospital twice.   The Court recalled that, in order to call for an ambulance, Sevastopol administration had first to give permission. That was a difficult decision to take given the absence of professional medical advice. Furthermore, the equipment in the first ambulance called had been manifestly inadequate and the doctor suggested that he be sent to a specialised hospital for further examination. However, the authorities had refused.   The parties had disagreed as to whether the doctors who examined the applicant on 14 April 2006 had recommended his hospitalisation. However, taking note of the letter of 21 April 2006, the Court could not accept the Government’s argument that the doctors who had examined the applicant had not recommended his hospitalisation. The applicant was only finally transferred to the Sevastopol Anti Tuberculosis Healthcare Centre at the Court’s request under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court. The applicant had stated that the delay of seven days was due to the Sevastopol ITT’s reluctance to use four officers to guard him in hospital. The Government had given no explanation. Lastly, although doctors on both those occasions had prescribed the applicant anti-tuberculosis treatment, there was no indication that Sevastopol ITT had made sure he had been provided with it.   In the Court's view, the failure to provide timely and appropriate medical care to the applicant in respect of his HIV and tuberculosis infections had amounted to inhuman and degrading treatment and there had therefore been a further violation of Article 3.   Repeated transport between detention centres   The Government, unlike the applicant, could have easily submitted details in support of their claims concerning transport. However, they had simply asserted that the conditions had been compatible with applicable standards and that the journey had been three times shorter than that claimed by the applicant. No copy of standards or regulations on prison vans had been submitted.   As regards the transport of prisoners, the CPT had considered individual compartments measuring 0.4, 0.5 or even 0.8   m 2 to be unsuitable for transporting a person, no matter how short the duration. Therefore, 0.3   m 2 for vans and 0.4   m 2 for trains failed to meet CPT standards.   The applicant’s submissions concerning poor lighting and ventilation and a lack of food and water were also corroborated by the CPT delegation’s findings in 2000.   Consequently the Court found a third and final violation of Article 3 on account of the applicant having to endure crammed conditions for a total of about 64 trips to and from Sevastopol over a period of two years and eight months.   Article 13   The Court found that there had been no effective and accessible remedy for the applicant to complain about his conditions of detention and therefore held that there had been a violation of 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] This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.