European Court of Human Rights

FIFTH SECTION

DECISION

AS TO THE ADMISSIBILITY OF

Application no. 78005/01
by Galina Alexandrovna SIDOROVA and
Anatoliy Alexandrovitch SIDOROV
against Russia

The European Court of Human Rights (Fifth Section), sitting on 9 September 2008 as a Chamber composed of:

Peer Lorenzen, President,
Rait Maruste,
Volodymyr Butkevych,
Anatoly Kovler,
Mark Villiger,
Mirjana Lazarova Trajkovska,
Zdravka Kalaydjieva, judges,
and Claudia Westerdiek, Section Registrar,

Having regard to the above application lodged on 16 April 2001,

Having regard to the observations submitted by the respondent Government and the observations in reply submitted by the applicants,

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

THE FACTS

The applicants, Mrs Galina Alexandrovna Sidorova and Mr Anatoliy Alexandrovich Sidorov, are Russian nationals who were born in 1958 and 1955 respectively and live in Talitsa, Sverdlovsk Region. The Russian Government (“the Government”) were represented by Mr P. Laptev, the Representative of the Russian Federation at the European Court of Human Rights.

A.  The circumstances of the case

The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows.

The second applicant, who has a second-degree disability, was arrested on 14 September 2000 and remanded in custody on suspicion of making defamatory accusations that judges and law enforcement officers had committed a serious crime, and of deliberate false reporting on the commission of a serious crime (Articles 298 § 3 and 306 § 2 of the Criminal Code). He complained that during the investigation he had been tied to a chair, metal objects had been attached to his head and struck violently so as to cause vibrations.

On 19 September 2000 the investigator of the Talitsky Prosecutor’s Office ordered an outpatient forensic psychiatric examination of the second applicant to determine his sanity at the time of the offence. The commission of experts recommended an inpatient examination in order to make a diagnosis.

On 4 October 2000 forensic experts drew up a report on the basis of the inpatient examination of the second applicant, which included the following findings:

“...According to the patient, he participated in military operations in Chechnya and suffered concussion ...The medical record confirms that Mr Sidorov has a second-degree disability due to a war injury sustained in Chechnya...

According to the medical documentation submitted, [the second applicant] was treated from 24 September to 2 October 1995 at the department of surgery of Talitsky Central Regional Hospital and diagnosed with ‘concussion, infected head wound, [and] chest contusion’...

On 24 September 1996 [the second applicant] consulted a psychiatrist. Diagnosis given – ‘anxious depressive syndrome’.... During 1997 he was hospitalised three times and diagnosed with ‘post-traumatic encephalopathy, psychosis excluding responsibility, [and] psycho-organic syndrome’...”

Conclusion

Mr Sidorov suffers from an organic lesion of the brain with marked mental change, epileptiform paroxysm, psychosis excluding responsibility... Those mental disorders are serious enough, and also have a tendency to progress, that they deprive the patient of the ability to realise the actual nature and social danger of his actions and to control them. Therefore, Mr Sidorov should be found insane with respect to the incriminating acts...”

On 2 February 2001 the Pyshminsk District Court gave its decision. Referring to the above-mentioned forensic examination, it held that at the time the acts in question were committed the second applicant had not been responsible for his actions and should not be held criminally liable.

The court released the second applicant from detention and ordered compulsory medical treatment, namely, outpatient psychiatric treatment.

It appears from the documents submitted that the applicants did not lodge an appeal against that decision; however, on an unspecified date the first applicant applied for a supervisory review, challenging the lawfulness and reasonableness of the decision of 2 February 2001. On 7 May 2001 her application was rejected by the President of the Sverdlovsk Regional Court who found the impugned decision lawful. Her further complaints to the Supreme Court were to no avail.

COMPLAINTS

Raising complaints under Article 3 of the Convention, the applicants alleged that the second applicant had been ill-treated during the pre-trial investigation. They stressed that prior to his detention in 2000 the second applicant had not suffered from any psychological disorder and that his present state of health was the result of the torture to which he had been subjected while in detention.

They further alleged that the second applicant had been unlawfully subjected to compulsory medical treatment for having expressed his opinions freely.

THE LAW

1. Under Article 3 of the Convention the applicants alleged that the second applicant had been subjected to ill-treatment upon his arrest on 14 September 2000, which led to his psychological disorder. This provision reads as follows:

“No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”

The Government stressed that the second applicant had participated in military operations in Chechnya, where he had sustained a brain injury. As of 1996 he was regularly treated in the Talitskiy Regional Clinical Psycho-neurologic Hospital for War Veterans. They referred to the forensic psychiatric report of 4 October 2000, and also submitted a copy of several medical documents, according to which the second applicant was diagnosed with “consequences of closed brain injury; psycho-organic and hypochondriac syndrome” on 2 April 1999 and with “organic disease of the cerebrum” on 22 July 1999. They further stated that the applicants’ allegations were baseless, and that the applicants had no medical report or any other evidence to substantiate their claim. Overall, they concluded that the complaint was completely groundless.

The applicants disagreed and insisted that the second applicant had been healthy prior to detention.

The Court notes at the outset that the parties did not dispute the first applicant’s status as a victim. However, the Court reiterates that under Article 34 of the Convention it may receive applications from individuals and others “claiming to be the victim of a violation by one of the High Contracting Parties of the rights set forth in the Convention or the Protocols thereto”. In order to claim to be a victim of a violation, a person must be directly affected by the impugned measure (see Buckley v. the United Kingdom, judgment of 25 September 1996, Reports 1996-IV, p. 128, p. 846, §§ 56-59). Turning to the present case, the Court notes that the first applicant was not the victim of the alleged ill-treatment. It therefore considers that her complaints are incompatible ratione personae with the provisions of the Convention within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 and must be rejected in accordance with Article 35 § 4.

As regards the second applicant’s complaint, the Court recalls that allegations of ill-treatment must be supported by appropriate evidence. To assess this evidence, the Court has generally applied the standard of proof “beyond reasonable doubt” (see Talat Tepe v. Turkey, no. 31247/96, § 48, 21 December 2004). Such proof may, however, follow from the coexistence of sufficiently strong, clear and concordant inferences or of similar unrebutted presumptions of fact (see Labita v. Italy [GC], no. 26772/95, § 121, ECHR 2000-IV).

In the instant case, the Court has been provided with a copy of the forensic psychiatric report drafted by a commission of medical experts on 4 October 2000, as well as other medical documents submitted by the Government, according to which the second applicant’s state of health was the result of the war injury sustained in 1995. The second applicant, in his turn, failed to provide any document to support his allegations. Moreover, he did not submit any documents to demonstrate that the complaints about ill-treatment during the pre-trial detention had been raised before the relevant domestic authorities in accordance with a procedure prescribed by law. The Court therefore considers that there is nothing in the case file to show that the second applicant was ill-treated as alleged.

In view of the above, the Court concludes that this part of the application should therefore be declared inadmissible as being manifestly ill-founded within the meaning of Article 35 §§ 3 and 4 of the Convention.

For these reasons, the Court unanimously

Declares the application inadmissible.

Claudia Westerdiek Peer Lorenzen
Registrar President