KOTOV AND OTHERS v. RUSSIA - 40122/16 (Judgment : Violation of - Prohibition of torture (Degrading treatment) (Substantive aspect) [2017] ECHR 1156 (14 December 2017)

In the case of Kotov and Others v. Russia,

The European Court of Human Rights (Third Section), sitting as a Committee composed of:

          Luis López Guerra, President,
          Dmitry Dedov,
          Jolien Schukking, judges,
and Liv Tigerstedt, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,

Having deliberated in private on 23 November 2017,

Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:

PROCEDURE

1. The case originated in applications against Russia lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on the various dates indicated in the appended table.

2. The applications were communicated to the Russian Government (“the Government”).

THE FACTS

3. The list of applicants and the relevant details of the applications are set out in the appended table.

4. The applicants complained of the inadequate conditions of their detention. Some applicants also raised other complaints under the provisions of the Convention.

THE LAW

I. JOINDER OF THE APPLICATIONS

5. Having regard to the similar subject matter of the applications, the Court finds it appropriate to examine them jointly in a single judgment.

II. ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLE 3 OF THE CONVENTION

6. The applicants complained principally of the inadequate conditions of their detention. They relied on Article 3 of the Convention, which reads as follows:

Article 3

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

7. The Court notes that the applicants were kept in detention in poor conditions. The details of the applicants’ detention are indicated in the appended table. The Court refers to the principles established in its case-law regarding inadequate conditions of detention (see, for instance, Kudła v. Poland [GC], no. 30210/96, §§ 90-94, ECHR 2000-XI, and Ananyev and Others v. Russia, nos. 42525/07 and 60800/08, §§ 139-165, 10 January 2012). It reiterates in particular that extreme lack of space in a prison cell or overcrowding weighs heavily as an aspect to be taken into account for the purpose of establishing whether the impugned detention conditions were “degrading” from the point of view of Article 3 and may disclose a violation, both alone or taken together with other shortcomings (see, amongst many authorities, Karalevičius v. Lithuania, no. 53254/99, §§ 36-40, 7 April 2005).

8. In the leading case of Sergey Babushkin v. Russia, no. 5993/08, 28 November 2013, the Court already found a violation in respect of issues similar to those in the present case.

9. Having examined all the material submitted to it, the Court has not found any fact or argument capable of persuading it to reach a different conclusion on the admissibility and merits of these complaints. Having regard to its case-law on the subject, the Court considers that in the instant case the applicants’ conditions of detention were inadequate.

10. These complaints are therefore admissible and disclose a breach of Article 3 of the Convention.

III. REMAINING COMPLAINTS

11. In applications nos. 40122/16, 41822/16, 61993/16, 8320/17, 8325/17 and 9999/17, the applicants also submitted complaints under Article 13 of the Convention, in accordance with the relevant well-established case-law of the Court (see appended table). These complaints are not manifestly ill-founded within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 (a) of the Convention, nor are they inadmissible on any other ground. Accordingly, they must be declared admissible. Having examined all the material before it, the Court concludes that they also disclose violations of the Convention in the light of its findings in Sergey Babushkin v. Russia (no. 5993/08, §§ 38-45, 28 November 2013, pertaining to the absence of an effective remedy to complaint about the conditions of detention in Russia).

IV. APPLICATION OF ARTICLE 41 OF THE CONVENTION

12. Article 41 of the Convention provides:

“If the Court finds that there has been a violation of the Convention or the Protocols thereto, and if the internal law of the High Contracting Party concerned allows only partial reparation to be made, the Court shall, if necessary, afford just satisfaction to the injured party.”

13. Regard being had to the documents in its possession and to its case-law (see, in particular, Sergey Babushkin v. Russia, (just satisfaction), no. 5993/08, 16 October 2014, and Mozharov and Others v. Russia, no. 16401/12 and 9 others, 21 March 2017), the Court considers it reasonable to award the sums indicated in the appended table.

14. The Court considers it appropriate that the default interest rate should be based on the marginal lending rate of the European Central Bank, to which should be added three percentage points.

FOR THESE REASONS, THE COURT, UNANIMOUSLY,

1. Decides to join the applications;

2. Declares the applications admissible;

3. Holds that these applications disclose a breach of Article 3 of the Convention concerning the inadequate conditions of detention;

4. Holds that there has been a violation of the Convention as regards the other complaints raised under well-established case-law of the Court (see appended table);

5. Holds

(a) that the respondent State is to pay the applicants, within three months, the amounts indicated in the appended table, to be converted into the currency of the respondent State at the rate applicable at the date of settlement;

(b) that from the expiry of the above-mentioned three months until settlement simple interest shall be payable on the above amounts at a rate equal to the marginal lending rate of the European Central Bank during the default period plus three percentage points.

Done in English, and notified in writing on 14 December 2017, pursuant to Rule 77 §§ 2 and 3 of the Rules of Court.

Liv Tigerstedt Luis López Guerra

Acting Deputy Registrar President

APPENDIX

List of applications raising complaints under Article 3 of the Convention

(inadequate conditions of detention)

No.	Application no. Date of introduction	Applicant name Date of birth	Representative name and location	Facility start and end date Duration	Inmates per brigade Sq. m. per inmate Number of toilets per brigade	Specific grievances	Other complaints under well-established case-law	Amount awarded for pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage and costs and expenses per applicant (in euros)[1]
1.	40122/16 06/06/2016	Vadim Viktorovich Kotov 23/10/1977	Golub Olga Viktorovna Suzemka	IK-1 Bryansk 20/07/2015 to 12/07/2017 1 year(s) and 11 month(s) and 23 day(s)		lack of privacy for toilet, lack of fresh air, no or restricted access to potable water, lack of or insufficient natural light, passive smoking, inadequate temperature, no or restricted access to warm water, lack of requisite medical assistance	Art. 13 - lack of any effective remedy in respect of inadequate conditions of detention -	8,000
2.	40508/16 24/07/2013	Vitaliy Maratovich Buntov 14/12/1976		IK-12 Perm Region 01/10/2012 to 28/05/2016 3 year(s) and 7 month(s) and 28 day(s)	200 inmate(s) 0.9-1 m²	lack of fresh air, passive smoking, lack of or inadequate hygienic facilities, inadequate temperature, overcrowding, poor quality of potable water, sharing cells with inmates infected with contagious disease, lack of requisite medical assistance, lack or insufficient quantity of food		13,000
3.	41113/16 11/07/2016	Pavel Vladimirovich Gudkov 26/01/1972	Vinogradov Aleksandr Vladimirovich Kostroma	IK-1 Kostroma Region 01/06/2013 to 06/06/2016 3 year(s) and 6 day(s)	2 m²	mouldy or dirty cell, infestation of cell with insects/rodents, overcrowding, lack of or insufficient physical exercise in fresh air, lack of or insufficient electric light, lack of fresh air, no or restricted access to running water, lack of privacy for toilet, sharing cells with inmates infected with contagious disease, poor quality of food		5,000
4.	41822/16 08/07/2016	Maksim Vasilyevich Rogoza 30/06/1985		IK-2 Zabaikalsky Region 11/11/2010 pending More than 6 year(s) and 11 month(s) and 11 day(s)	1.3-1.5 m²	lack of fresh air, inadequate temperature, no or restricted access to toilet, lack of privacy for toilet, no or restricted access to warm water	Art. 13 - lack of any effective remedy in respect of inadequate conditions of detention -	9,000
5.	61993/16 26/12/2016	Nikolay Igorevich Grebennikov 15/10/1970		К 231/7-28 Kirov Region 15/10/2013 pending More than 4 year(s) and 7 day(s)	2.3 m²	overcrowding, lack of or insufficient natural light, lack of fresh air, poor quality of potable water, no or restricted access to warm water, infestation of cell with insects/rodents, lack of or poor quality of bedding and bed linen, lack of privacy for toilet, poor quality of food, inadequate temperature	Art. 13 - lack of any effective remedy in respect of inadequate conditions of detention -	7,500
6.	72722/16 27/10/2016	Vladimir Anatolyevich Rudykh 01/10/1970		IK-56 Yekaterinburg Region 02/11/2010 pending More than 6 year(s) and 11 month(s) and 20 day(s)		lack of or insufficient natural light, lack of fresh air, no or restricted access to potable water, lack of privacy for toilet, no or restricted access to shower, lack of or insufficient physical exercise in fresh air		8,000
7.	8320/17 12/01/2017	Aleksandr Sergeyevich Artamonov 26/08/1982	Vinogradov Aleksandr Vladimirovich Kostroma	IK-1 Kostroma Region 29/05/2002 to 28/11/2016 14 year(s) and 6 month(s)	100 inmate(s) 0.6 m²	overcrowding, lack of or insufficient electric light, inadequate temperature, poor quality of food, infestation of cell with insects/rodents, mouldy or dirty cell	Art. 13 - lack of any effective remedy in respect of inadequate conditions of detention -	5,000
8.	8325/17 14/01/2017	Nikolay Nikolayevich Lebedev 01/08/1970	Vinogradov Aleksandr Vladimirovich Kostroma	IK-1 Kostroma Region 27/10/2011 pending More than 5 year(s) and 11 month(s) and 25 day(s)	50 inmate(s) 1.6 m² 2 toilet(s)	overcrowding, lack of or insufficient electric light, poor quality of food, infestation of cell with insects/rodents	Art. 13 - lack of any effective remedy in respect of inadequate conditions of detention -	7,500
9.	9999/17 13/01/2017	Aleksey Nikolayevich Artamonov 16/01/1956	Vinogradov Aleksandr Vladimirovich Kostroma	IK-1 Kostroma Region Unit 4 17/09/2012 to 16/09/2016 4 year(s)	2 m²	poor quality of food, lack of or inadequate hygienic facilities, infestation of cell with insects/rodents, mouldy or dirty cell, lack of or insufficient physical exercise in fresh air	Art. 13 - lack of any effective remedy in respect of inadequate conditions of detention -	5,000
10.	10191/17 09/01/2017	Yevgeniy Leonidovich Payusov 21/02/1978		IK-1 Arkhangelsk Region 05/02/2010 pending More than 7 year(s) and 8 month(s) and 17 day(s)	90 inmate(s) 1.6 m² 5 toilet(s)	overcrowding, no or restricted access to warm water, bunk beds, lack of or insufficient natural light		7,500

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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> European Court of Human Rights >> KOTOV AND OTHERS v. RUSSIA - 40122/16 (Judgment : Violation of - Prohibition of torture (Degrading treatment) (Substantive aspect) [2017] ECHR 1156 (14 December 2017) URL: http://www.bailii.org/eu/cases/ECHR/2017/1156.html Cite as: [2017] ECHR 1156, CE:ECHR:2017:1214JUD004012216, ECLI:CE:ECHR:2017:1214JUD004012216