Communicated on 18 September 2020
Published on 5 October 2020
FIRST SECTION
Application no. 27318/19
Arkadiusz ŁAKATOSZ
against Poland
lodged on 10 May 2019
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The applicant, Mr Arkadiusz Łakatosz, is a Polish national, who was born in 1968. He was detained in the Poznań Detention Centre until at least 1 March 2020. He is represented before the Court by Mr P. Sołtysiak, a lawyer practising in Poznań.The circumstances of the caseThe applicant’s detention
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
On an unspecified date the applicant was charged with four counts of large-scale fraud. Allegedly, the applicant had acted in an organised criminal group in four different counties, namely Switzerland, Germany, Austria and Poland. In the course of the investigation three out of four charges originally laid against the applicant were dropped. On the other hand, the applicant was charged with new offences. The final bill of indictment referred to nine charges against the applicant.
On 5 February 2017 the Warszawa–Mokotów District Court (Sąd Rejonowy) set a bail in the amount of 300,000 Polish zlotys (PLN) (approximately 75,000 euros (EUR)). Additionally, the applicant was prohibited from leaving the country and was subjected to police supervision. The Warsaw Regional Prosecution Office (Prokuratura Okręgowa) appealed against this decision. On 16 February 2017 the Warsaw Regional Court (Sąd Okręgowy) altered the challenged decision and detained the applicant on remand for three months starting from the date of his arrest. The applicant went into hiding. He was arrested on 16 March 2017. On 27 March 2017 the Warszawa–Mokotów District Court upheld the applicant’s detention. On 5 May 2017 the Warsaw Regional Court dismissed the applicant’s appeal.
In the course of the investigation the applicant’s detention was extended several times by the Warsaw Regional Court (on 12 June, 16 August, 16 November 2017, and on 12 January 2018) and by the Warsaw Court of Appeal (on 9 March and 5 June 2018).
The applicant appealed against all the decisions extending his pre-trial detention. All his appeals were dismissed by second-instance courts.
The domestic courts based their decisions on a significant probability that the applicant had committed the offences in question and on the fact that he faced a severe penalty. Moreover, the fact that he had been accused of committing offences within an organised criminal group and some of his alleged accomplices had been his family members, was considered as factors increasing the risk of obstruction of the proceedings. The courts referred to the substantial body of evidence that had to be obtained and to the complicated international nature of the case. Finally, they emphasised that the applicant did not have a permanent place of residence and that at an early stage of the investigation he had gone into hiding.
The bill of indictment against the applicant was lodged with the Warsaw Regional Court on 27 August 2018. On 6 September 2018 the Warsaw Regional Court extended the applicant’s detention until 5 January 2019.
On 18 September 2018 the Warsaw Regional Court remitted the bill of indictment to the prosecutor, holding that the case-file had not included various documents necessary to examine the case, inter alia, duly signed copies of different documents and notified translations, copies of court orders allowing for interception of telephone calls used in the course of the investigation, a testimony of one witness, an additional expert opinion and transcript of intercepted telephone calls. On 19 December 2018 the Warsaw Court of Appeal dismissed the prosecutor’s appeal against that decision.
After the case had been remitted to the investigation stage, the applicant’s detention was extended by the Warsaw Court of Appeal on 22 October 2018, 4 January, 1 April, 3 July, 1 October and 27 November 2019. On 27 November 2019 the applicant’s detention was extended until 1 March 2020. The applicant’s lawyer has not provided the Court with information on whether the detention was extended beyond 1 March 2020 or whether the applicant was released.
The domestic courts continued to rely on previously invoked grounds for the detention. On some occasions instead of providing relevant grounds for detention they partly referred to their previous decisions (the Warsaw Court of Appeal decisions of 18 February 2019, case no. II AKz 65/19, and of 1 April 2019, case no. II Akp 41/19). The courts also stressed the fact that the applicant and his alleged accomplices were of Roma origin and had strong ties to the Roma community, which resulted in the risk of absconding if the applicant was released from detention. Moreover, the courts referred to difficulties in finding a translator for the purposes of the investigation.
The applicant appealed against most of the decisions extending his pre-trial detention. All of his appeals were dismissed by second-instance courts.
A new bill of indictment was lodged with the relevant domestic court on 19 November 2019.
The proceedings are pending before the first-instance court.The applicant’s appeals against the decisions of 3 July and 1 October 2019
On 3 July 2019 the Warsaw Court of Appeal extended the applicant’s detention until 2 October 2019. On 9 July 2019 the applicant appealed. His appeal was dismissed by the same court acting as a second instance court on 13 November 2019, that is after the period of the original extension.
On 1 October 2019 the applicant’s detention was extended until 1 December 2019. On an unspecified date the applicant appealed. His appeal was examined on 27 November 2019.Relevant domestic law and practice
The relevant domestic law and practice concerning detention on remand (tymczasowe aresztowanie), the grounds for its extension, release from detention and rules governing other so-called “preventive measures” (środki zapobiegawcze) are set out in the court’s judgments in the cases of Gołek v. Poland (no. 31330/02, §§ 27-33, 25 April 2006), Celejewski v. Poland (no. 17584/04, §§ 22-23, 4 May 2006) and Kauczor v. Poland (no. 45219/06, §§ 25-33, 3 February 2009).
COMPLAINTS
The applicant complains under Article 5 § 3 of the Convention of the unreasonable length of his detention on remand.
He further complains under Article 5 § 4 of the Convention that the domestic courts failed to examine “speedily” his appeals against the extension of his detention ordered by the Warsaw Court of Appeal on 3 July and 1 October 2019.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Was the length of the applicant’s pre-trial detention in breach of the “reasonable time” requirement of Article 5 § 3 of the Convention?
2. Did the length of the proceedings in the present case, whereby the applicant sought to challenge the lawfulness of the extension of his detention ordered by the Warsaw Court of Appeal on 3 July and on 1 October 2019 comply with the “speediness” requirement laid down in Article 5 § 4 of the Convention?
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