FIRST SECTION
Application no. 7334/13
Kristijan MURŠIĆ
against Croatia
lodged on 17 December 2012
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The applicant, Mr Kristijan Muršić, is a Croatian national, who was born in 1987 and lives in Kuršanec. He is represented before the Court by Mr Z. Vidović, a lawyer practising in Varaždin.
The circumstances of the case
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
On an unspecified date in 2010 the applicant started to serve his prison sentence in Bjelovar Prison (Zatvor u Bjelovaru) where he stayed for eleven months. During his stay in that prison he was placed in a room which, according to the applicant, failed to meet the required minimum standards of personal space. Sanitary conditions were also very poor given that each room had open toilet and a dining table near to the toilet; the inmates did not have lockers for their personal belongings; and he was not afforded any possibility to work or any outdoor activities.
On an unspecified date 2010 the applicant complained to a sentence-execution judge of the Bjelovar County Court (Županijski sud u Bjelovaru, sudac izvršenja) about the conditions of his detention.
On 7 October 2010 the sentence-execution judge dismissed the applicant’s complaints noting that he had been placed in a room measuring 19,6 square metres with four other inmates and thus afforded sufficient personal space. She also noted that the applicant had been provided with the personal hygiene items and that there had been no practical possibility for his working engagement.
The applicant appealed against this decision to a three-judge panel of the Bjelovar County Court arguing that the findings of the sentence-execution judge had not been correct.
On 21 October 2010 a three-judge panel, examining the applicant’s appeal, considered that the requirement for minimum personal space should be complied with in principal and that therefore the applicant’s rights had not been breached. It provided no specific reasoning for such findings but noted that for a shorter period of time more inmates had been placed in the same room with the applicant, without specifying the exact number of inmates or the exact period of time concerned.
Against the decision of the three-judge panel of the Bjelovar County Court the applicant lodged a constitutional complaint.
On 5 June 2012 the Constitutional Court (Ustavni sud Republike Hrvatske) declared the applicant’s constitutional complaint inadmissible as manifestly ill-founded.
The decision of the Constitutional Court was served on the applicant’s representative on 20 June 2012.
COMPLAINTS
The applicant complains, under Article 3 of the Convention, about the conditions of his detention in Bjelovar Prison.
He also complains, relying on Article 6 of the Convention, about the lack of an effective remedy in that respect.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Have the conditions of the applicant’s detention, in view of the size of his cell, the number of inmates placed in the same cell at the material time or any other condition amounted specifically or cumulatively to inhuman or degrading treatment in breach of Article 3 of the Convention (see Ananyev and Others v. Russia, nos. 42525/07 and 60800/08, 10 January 2012; and Longin v. Croatia, no. 49268/10, 6 November 2012)?
In that regard, the Government are required to provide detailed information about the conditions in which the applicant has been detained, including information about the size of each of the applicant’s dormitories and their state of repair, access to drinking water, access to toilet and washing facilities, access to natural light and fresh air, hygiene, food, clothing, heating, ventilation, outdoor activities, opportunity to work and educational and leisure facilities.
2. Did the applicant have at his disposal an effective domestic remedy for his Article 3 of the Convention complaint concerning the conditions of his detention, as required by Article 13 of the Convention?
The Government are required to submit all relevant materials concerning the applicant’s conviction, copies of all of the applicant’s submissions to any State authority about the conditions in Bjelovar Prison, as well as replies in that connection.
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