Communicated on 28 March 2019
SECOND SECTION
Application no. 32043/11
Ramazan ORAL and others
against Turkey
lodged on 23 September 2009
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns the validity of the applicants’ waiver of their right to lawyer when making statements during the different phases of the investigation stage and the third applicant’s alleged inability to confront S.T. whose incriminatory police statements in respect of him were relied on by the trial court to convict him (see Simeonovi v. Bulgaria [GC], no. 21980/04, 12 May 2017; Schatschaschwili v. Germany [GC], no. 9154/10, ECHR 2015; and Gökbulut v. Turkey, no. 7459/04, 29 March 2016).
QUESTIONS tO THE PARTIES
1. Did the applicant have a fair hearing in the determination of the criminal charges against him, in accordance with Article 6 § 1 of the Convention?
(a) Has there been a breach of Article 6 § 3 (c) of the Convention, as a result of the lack of legal assistance available to the applicant during the preliminary investigation? In particular, could the applicant be considered to have waived his right to legal assistance when giving statements to the police and the investigating judge (see Simeonovi v. Bulgaria [GC], no. 21980/04, 12 May 2017)?
2. Was the third applicant able to examine S.T. as required by Article 6 § 3 (d) of the Convention? What steps did the domestic courts take to secure the attendance of that individual?
(a) Was there a good reason for the non-attendance of the above-mentioned individual at the trial? Were the factual or legal grounds of such a reason reflected in the domestic courts’ judgments?
(b) Did S.T.’s statements serve as the sole or decisive evidence for the applicant’s conviction?
(c) Did the domestic courts’ judgments indicate that they had approached those with any specific caution?
(d) Did the domestic courts provide the applicant with procedural safeguards aimed at compensating for the alleged lack of opportunity to directly examine S.T. at the trial?
The Government are invited to submit copies of all the relevant documents concerning the applicant’s case, including but not limited to the minutes of all the hearings, the reasoned judgment of the trial court, documentary evidence against the applicant, and the written submissions of the applicant and his lawyer throughout the proceedings.
APPENDIX
Ramazan ORAL Enver TEKİN İbrahim Halil YAHLI
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy