Communicated on 24 June 2016
FOURTH SECTION
Application no. 54917/13
Aldona AKELIENĖ
against Lithuania
lodged on 20 August 2013
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The applicant, Ms Aldona Akelienė, is a Lithuanian national who was born in 1935 and lives in Kalvarija.
A. The circumstances of the case
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
In December 1993 a large sum of money disappeared from A.G.’s mother’s home in the town of Kalvarija. A.G. suspected the applicant’s son R.A., and R.A.’s friend, Z.V., of having stolen the money and devised a plan in order to have it returned by force.
On 19 April 1994 A.G., acting with three accomplices, forced R.A. and Z.V. into a car and drove them to a forest in Kalvarija. R.A. and Z.V. were tied to a tree, interrogated, beaten, put in a hole in the ground and, when they tried to escape, shot, stabbed and thus killed. Both victims were then buried in the forest in an attempt to hide the evidence. Their bodies have never been found.
In autumn 1994 the authorities started connecting A.G. to the disappearance of the applicant’s son and Z.V. On 25 October 1994 A.G. was arrested and placed in pre-trial detention. However, as established by court decisions, when two witnesses gave false testimony that they had seen the two missing people alive, on 4 November 1994 A.G. was released from pre-trial detention.
It appears that the investigation into the circumstances of the two men’s disappearance continued. According to the applicant, in June 2005 A.G. absconded from the investigation and went into hiding in the United Kingdom for nearly one year.
In August 2005 the Deputy Attorney General issued a European Arrest Warrant in respect of A.G., who was suspected of having committed aggravated murder, an offence which could attract life imprisonment.
Having returned to Lithuania of his own free will, in March 2006 A.G. was questioned as a suspect in R.A.’s and Z.V.’s murder. He denied any involvement.
From 17 March to 22 November 2006 A.G. was again detained pending trial. In November 2006 the Court of Appeal ordered his release for lack of evidence corroborating his guilt. The Court of Appeal also considered that, in reality, the police had not been actively searching for A.G., because during the relevant time A.G. had taken part in an unrelated court hearing in Lithuania, and had also crossed the Lithuanian State border a number of times.
Afterwards, A.G. was also charged with offering a bribe to a police investigator on 22 March 2006, in an attempt to persuade the latter not to actively pursue leads in the criminal murder case, so that the remand measure which had been applied to A.G. – pre-trial detention – could be replaced with a less stringent one.
By a judgment of 2 February 2009 the Kaunas Regional Court acquitted A.G. of murder and attempted bribery.
On 27 November 2012 the Court of Appeal reversed that judgment and, on the basis of all the evidence, found A.G. guilty of the aggravated murder of two people and attempted bribery of a pre-trial investigation officer. A.G. was sentenced to fourteen years of imprisonment. The time which he had already spent in pre-trial detention was to count as time served in relation to that sentence. The Court of Appeal noted that A.G. had no prior convictions; he worked, was married and had four children. Moreover, the criminal proceedings had lasted a particularly long time, which was reason to impose a lesser punishment than the maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
By the same judgment, the Court of Appeal also awarded the applicant and her daughter 150,000 Lithuanian litai (LTL) (approximately 43,500 euros (EUR)) each, as compensation for non-pecuniary damage in respect of the loss of their son and brother respectively.
The 27 November 2012 judgment of the Court of Appeal was to be transferred to a court of first instance for execution within seven days of being adopted. A.G. did not attend the Court of Appeal hearing when the judgment was pronounced. Instead, he fled from the Lithuanian law enforcement authorities. In December 2013 the police announced a national and international search in respect of A.G.
In December 2012 the Kaunas Regional Court also issued a writ of execution, pursuant to which the applicant and R.A.’s sister (the applicant’s daughter) were to get LTL 150,000 each from A.G. However, in June 2013 a bailiff informed the applicant that the debt could not be recovered from A.G., because he was in hiding.
On 25 June 2013 the Supreme Court dismissed appeals on points of law by the applicant’s daughter, who wanted A.G. to have a harsher sentence, and by A.G., who wanted to be acquitted.
B. Relevant domestic law
For relevant domestic law and practice, see Česnulevičius v. Lithuania, (no. 13462/06, §§ 47-50, 10 January 2012).
COMPLAINTS
Without referring to any provision of the Convention, the applicant complains that the criminal proceedings relating to her son’s murder were not effective. She underlines that although A.G. had a history of fleeing from justice, the authorities acted recklessly prior to the Court of Appeal’s decision of 27 November 2012, because no remand measures to prevent him from escaping again (such as confiscating his passport, or ordering him to remain at his place of residence or register with the police) were taken. The damages awarded to her by the court may not be obtained.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Having regard to the procedural protection of the right to life (see Česnulevičius v. Lithuania, no. 13462/06, §§ 92 and 93, 10 January 2012), were the criminal proceedings initiated by the domestic authorities in the present case in breach of Article 2 of the Convention?
2. The Government are requested to provide information as to whether A.G. has been arrested and has started to serve his sentence, and whether or to what extent he has compensated the applicant.
3. The Government are also requested to provide the Court with a copy of the Court of Appeal decision of November 2006 to release A.G. from pre-trial detention.
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