European Court of Human Rights

THIRD SECTION

Application no. 19779/11
by Remus TUDOR
against Romania
lodged on 4 February 2011

STATEMENT OF FACTS

THE FACTS

The applicant, Mr Remus Tudor, is a Romanian national who was born in 1966 and lives in Jilava. He is represented before the Court by Mr M. V. Panaitescu, a lawyer practising in Bucharest.

A.  The circumstances of the case

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

In 1990 the applicant was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to life imprisonment. He has been held in a number of different detention centres. No information is available in respect of his places of detention before 8 April 2009. From the latter date until the present he has been detained in Jilava Prison.

At present he is in cell no. 207, which according to the applicant has a surface area of 27 sq. m (6 metres in length and 4.5 metres wide). He shares this cell with thirteen other prisoners. The cell is equipped with two squat toilets (only one functional), separated from the rest of the room by a wall.

The room does not have any furniture in which to keep personal objects and food; therefore the prisoners are forced to keep them under their beds where there are hundreds of insects.

The temperature in the cell is very low during winter.

The applicant claims that for three months, from April until July 2009 they did not have hot water. The prisoners were confronted with the same situation in the summer of 2010 when they had to live without hot water from 28 June until 5 August 2010.

He claims that even though he is a non-smoker, he has to share the cell with eleven smokers. He further claims that in his cell there are four prisoners who frequently consume drugs. Therefore, he concludes that the smoke from the cigarettes combined with the smoke released from the drugs makes the air in the cell unbreathable.

B.  Relevant domestic law

Law no. 275/2006 on the execution of sentences provides that sentences should be served in conditions compatible with respect for human dignity, and that each detainee should have their own bed, cells should have natural light, and so on. One or more judges are delegated by the local appeal court to supervise the observance of the rights guaranteed by the law and they examine the complaints of detainees. It is possible to lodge an appeal with a court against these decisions.

Excerpts from the relevant parts of the reports of the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (the CPT), as well as reports of the Romanian Helsinki Committee, are given in Bragadireanu v. Romania (no. 22088/04, §§ 73-75, 6 December 2007).

The conclusions of the CPT regarding the conditions of detention in Jilava Prison, published in April 2003 after its visit in February 1999 are described in Eugen Gabriel Radu v. Romania (no. 3036/04, § 30, 13 October 2009), and Ciupercescu v. Romania (no. 35555/03, § 87, 15 June 2010).

After its visit to a wing of Jilava Prison in June 2006 (report published in December 2008), the CPT concluded that the conditions of detention remained mainly the same as those observed in 1999.

COMPLAINT

The applicant complains under Article 3 of the Convention about the conditions of his detention in Jilava Prison, especially with regard to overcrowding.

QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES

1.  Does Law no. 275/2006 on the execution of sentences provide for an effective remedy with regard to the material conditions of detention?

In this connection, the Government are invited to submit relevant domestic case-law.

2.  Are the conditions of the applicant’s detention in Jilava Prison in breach of the requirements of Article 3 of the Convention, taking into account his allegations regarding the overcrowding, hygiene conditions and smoke in the cell?

The Government are invited to provide additional information concerning the conditions of the applicant’s detention, in particular concerning the size of the respective cells and the facilities available.