FOURTH SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 33213/15
Marian-Leonardo VASILE
against Romania
The European Court of Human Rights (Fourth Section), sitting on 17 May 2023 as a Committee composed of:
Tim Eicke, President,
Branko Lubarda,
Ana Maria Guerra Martins, judges,
and Viktoriya Maradudina, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to the above application lodged on 6 January 2016,
Having regard to the observations submitted by the respondent Government and the observations in reply submitted by the applicant,
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
FACTS AND PROCEDURE
The applicant, Mr. Marian-Leonardo Vasile, is a Romanian national born in 1989. He was imprisoned in several Romanian detention facilities.
The applicant complained under Article 3 of the Convention about the inadequate conditions of detention served between 12 August 2013 and 31 July 2014 and between 25 August 2014 and 15 November 2016 in the Giurgiu Prison. His complaints were communicated to the Romanian Government (“the Government”).
THE LAW
Having examined all the material before it, the Court considers that for the reasons stated below, the application is inadmissible.
The Court reiterates that Article 35 § 2 (b) of the Convention provides that it should not deal with any application submitted under Article 34 that is substantially the same as a matter that has already been examined by the Court and contains no relevant new information. In verifying whether two cases are essentially the same, it takes into account the identity of the parties in both proceedings, the legal provisions on which they are based, the nature of the complaints and the compensation which they seek to obtain (see Verein gegen Tierfabriken Schweiz (VgT) v. Switzerland (no. 2) [GC], no. 32772/02, § 63, ECHR 2009 and, mutatis mutandis, Smirnova and Smirnova v. Russia (dec.), nos. 46133/99 and 48183/99, 3 October 2002; and Folgerø and Others v. Norway (dec.), no. 15472/02, 14 February 2006).
In the instant case, the Court notes that the applicant lodged another application before it, registered under no. 40750/16, raising, under Article 3, a complaint similar to that raised in the context of the present application. Application no. 40750/16, adducing evidence which has also been submitted in the instant case, was struck out of the Court’s list of cases in accordance with Article 37 § 1 (c) of the Convention, on the basis of a unilateral declaration (see Vasile and Others v. Romania (dec.), nos. 40750/16 and 7 others, 25 August 2022).
The Court must therefore determine whether, in the present case, the application is “substantially the same” as the matter submitted to it in application no. 40750/16.
In the present case, the applicant submitted that he had been held in inadequate conditions of detention between 12 August 2013 and 31 July 2014 and between 25 August 2014 and 15 November 2016 in the Giurgiu Prison. He complained, inter alia, of overcrowding, lack of access to warm water, poor quality of food, inadequate temperature, infestation of cells with insects and rodents, and poor quality of bedding and bed linen.
In application no. 40750/16, the applicant submitted that he had been held in inadequate conditions of detention between 4 December 2012 and 15 November 2016 in the Bucharest Police Station no. 19, and the Rahova, Giurgiu, Aiud and Jilava Prisons, citing overcrowding, restricted access to running water, infestation of cell with insects and rodents, and lack of adequate furniture.
By comparing the two applications, the Court notes that the same applicant raised the same complaints with regards to the conditions of detention in the Romanian prisons, in particular in the Giurgiu Prison, during the same period, and that he has not submitted any evidence that would constitute a new fact within the meaning of Article 35 § 2 (b) of the Convention (see, a contrario, Delgado v. France, no. 38437/97, Commission decision of 9 September 1998, and C.G. and Others v. Bulgaria (dec.), no. 1365/07, 13 March 2007).
It follows that since the present application raises “essentially the same” complaints as the ones examined by the Court in application no. 40750/16 lodged by the applicant, Marian-Leonardo Vasile, it falls within the ambit of Article 35 § 2 (b) of the Convention and must therefore be rejected, pursuant to Article 35 §§ 2 and 4.
For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,
Declares the application inadmissible.
Done in English and notified in writing on 8 June 2023.
Viktoriya Maradudina Tim Eicke
Acting Deputy Registrar President