FIFTH SECTION
Application no. 55902/11
Olena Prokopivna RYZHENKO
against Ukraine
lodged on 23 August 2011
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The applicant, Ms Olena Prokopivna Ryzhenko, is a Ukrainian national, who was born in 1947.
On 27 February 2012 she died, and her daughter, Ms P., expressed the wish to pursue the application.
A. The circumstances of the case
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
On 13 October 2008 the applicant’s son (and the brother of Ms P.), Mr R., was found dead in the pond which he had been guarding as a night watchman.
On the following day a post-mortem examination was completed. It concluded that Mr R. had drowned. The following injuries were discovered on his chest: a bruise of 10 x 8 cm and sores of 21 x 1 cm and 5 x 0.9 cm, as well as another round sore, in the middle of the bruise, of 4 cm in diameter. These injuries had been inflicted by blunt hard objects. They were considered to be of light gravity and irrelevant for the death.
The police refused to institute criminal proceedings in respect of this death eleven times. All those rulings were quashed by the prosecution authorities and the courts for superficiality and incompleteness of the investigation undertaken.
On 13 May 2009 the applicant brought an administrative claim before the Monastyryshche Town Court against the local police complaining about their unlawful inactivity in the investigation.
On 25 May 2009 the court allowed her claim in part. It held that the local police had indeed failed to take all the legally envisaged measures for a complete and objective investigation of the death of Mr R. The court also noted that the higher prosecution authorities’ guidelines had been ignored and that the applicant had not been duly informed of the investigation progress.
According to the most recent information from Ms P., as of July 2012 criminal proceedings had not been instituted.
COMPLAINTS
Relying on Articles 6 and 13 of the Convention, the applicant complained about the length and ineffectiveness of the domestic investigation into the circumstances of the death of her son.
QUESTIONS
1. Having regard to the procedural protection of the right to life, was the investigation by the domestic authorities into the death of the applicant’s son sufficient, from the point of view of Article 2 of the Convention?
2. Are there any safeguards for ensuring compliance of the investigating authority with the instructions given by the higher-level prosecutor or a court where a case is remitted for additional investigation?
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