THIRD SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 41969/05
Yevgeniy Ruslanovich SHESTAKOV against Russia
and 7 other applications
(see list appended)
The European Court of Human Rights (Third Section), sitting on 25 September 2018 as a Committee composed of:
Alena Poláčková, President,
Dmitry Dedov,
Jolien Schukking, judges,
and Fatoş Aracı, Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to the above applications lodged on the various dates indicated in the appended table,
Having regard to the observations submitted by the respondent Government and the observations in reply submitted by the applicants,
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
THE FACTS
1. The applicants are Russian nationals living in various regions of the Russian Federation. Their personal details appear in the appended table.
2. The Russian Government ("the Government") were represented initially by Mr G. Matyushkin, the Representative of the Russian Federation to the European Court of Human Rights, and then by his successor in that office, Mr M. Galperin.
3. The facts of the cases, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows.
4. On various dates between 2005 and 2014 the applicants were criminally prosecuted and convicted of various offences.
5. The applicants’ convictions were based among other evidence on the statements of one or more witnesses for prosecution, which were made during pre-trial stages of the proceedings and read out in open court while those witnesses were absent.
6. Allowing the witnesses’ pre-trial statements as evidence the trial courts in their judgments relied on the impossibility to locate them, and/or their refusal to appear at court, and/or remoteness of their place of residence as well as engagements existing at the material time and/or their poor state of health that made impossible for them to appear before the court.
7. The convictions were based on a multiplicity of evidence, including statements by the applicants made at the pre-trial stage and at trial in the presence of their lawyers, trial statements by the police officers, other witnesses for prosecution, material and documentary evidence. The domestic courts analysed the witnesses’ pre-trial statements and established their coherence and consistency with other evidence.
8. The judgments of the trial courts were upheld on appeal.
COMPLAINTS
9. The applicants complained under Article 6 §§ 1 and 3 (d) of the Convention that the domestic courts had not provided good reasons for reading-out of the pre-trial statements of the witnesses for prosecution and thus the applicants had been unable to have those witnesses examined at the trial.
THE LAW
10. The Court first considers that in accordance with Rule 42 § 1 of the Rules of Court, the applications listed in the appended table should be joined, given their common legal background.
11. The respondent Government in their observations argued that applicants had had a fair hearing in the determination of the criminal charges against them in accordance with Article 6 § 1 of the Convention. They argued that the applicants’ convictions were based on other abundant evidence. Referring to the provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, as well as the relevant interpretative guidelines and practice of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation and the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation, the Government contended that the Russian legal system had afforded the applicants sufficient procedural safeguards aimed at securing their right to examine witnesses testifying against them and guarantees of a fair trial.
12. Certain applicants disagreed, while the others did not provide specific arguments.
13. The Court has carefully examined the applications listed in the appended table and concluded that, in the light of the Court’s primary concern under Article 6 § 1 to evaluate the overall fairness of the criminal proceedings (see Al-Khawaja and Tahery v. the United Kingdom [GC], nos. 26766/05 and 22228/06, § 118, ECHR 2011, and Schatschaschwili v. Germany [GC], no. 9154/10, § 101, ECHR 2015), the presumption that in principle the Russian legal system offers robust procedural guarantees securing the right of an accused to examine witnesses testifying against him, ensuring that the reading out of absent witnesses’ testimony is possible only as an exception (see Zadumov v. Russia, no. 2257/12, § 63, 12 December 2017, recently reiterated in Kiba and Others (dec.), nos. 38047/08 and 2 others, § 16, 17 April 2018), the material in its possession, and in so far as the matters complained of are within its competence, the applications are manifestly ill-founded, and thus must be rejected in accordance with Article 35 §§ 3 (a) and 4 of the Convention.
For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,
Decides to join the applications;
Declares the applications inadmissible.
Done in English and notified in writing on 18 October 2018.
Fatoş AracıAlena Poláčková
Deputy RegistrarPresident
APPENDIX
No.
Application
no.
Date of introduction
Applicant name
Date of birth
Place of residence
Represented by
Date of the trial and appeal courts’ judgments
Witness absent from trial
41969/05
31/10/2005
Yevgeniy Ruslanovich SHESTAKOV
19/02/1983
Mtsensk
Butyrskiy District Court of Moscow
09/03/2005
Moscow City Court
15/06/2005
Convicted of several counts of aggravated robbery in conspiracy
Mr K.
7873/08
26/01/2008
Vladimir Aleksandrovich MOROSYAK
01/12/1978
Tomsk
Larisa Nikolayevna AGAPOVA
Kirovskiy District Court of Tomsk
27/06/2007
Tomsk Regional Court
13/08/2007
Convicted of sexual assault of an elderly woman (88 years old)
Mrs A.
24755/08
16/03/2008
Andrey Vladimirovich RANKIN
19/11/1976
Severodvinsk
Igor Yuryevich TELYATYEV
Severodvinskiy Town Court of the Arkhangelsk Region
21/09/2007
Arkhangelsk Regional Court
06/11/2007
Convicted of infliction of grievous bodily injuries that led to the victim’s death
Mrs K.
32927/10
18/05/2010
Mikhail Semenovich BAKHSHYAN
07/07/1986
Krasnodar
Irina Rufimovna MINVALEYEVA
Pervomayskiy District Court of Krasnodar
17/08/2009
Krasnodar Regional Court
18/11/2009
Convicted of infliction of grievous bodily injuries to the victim
Mr D.
49120/10
29/07/2010
Roman Alekseyevich GOLOVKO
26/02/1970
Ulan-Ude
Timiryazevskiy District Court of Moscow
24/12/2009
Moscow City Court
16/06/2010
Convicted of attempted drug dealing in conspiracy
Mr Sh.
49151/10
10/08/2010
Sergey Alekseyevich ARTYUSHKIN
24/08/1977
Ulyanovsk
Leninskiy District Court of Ulyanovsk
12/02/2010
Ulyanovsk Regional Court
31/03/2010
Convicted of attempted drug dealing in conspiracy
Mrs P.
49361/10
09/08/2010
Aleksey Vladimirovich KACHALIN
12/04/1978
Yelizavetinskaya
Vladimir Nikolayevich YEREMENKO
Temryukskiy District Court of the Krasnodar Region
29/12/2009
Krasnodar Regional Court
03/03/2009
Convicted of infliction of grievous bodily injuries that led to the victim’s death
Mr A.,
Mr K.,
Mr S.
42424/14
31/05/2014
Pavel Viktorovich ANISIMOV
27/08/1981
Murmansk
Aleksandr Yuryevich DERIYEV
Leninskiy District Court of Moscow
20/02/2014
Murmanks Regional Court
22/04/2014
Convicted of attempted drug dealing
Mr K.
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